Oh, people really like playing it. But if you tell people around here "Let's play a cube, but you can't reanimate Sundering Titan on turn two or play Splinter Twin because instead we have balanced gameplay", people tend to pass. They instinctively would rather make airplane and laser noises with their mouths while doing "powerful things"
lol - I feel this so much. I have multiple cubes and the powered vintage list is by far "the cube". When the guys come over for cube, that's the one they expect to come out first. The others I've built tend to be the ones we draft once we've ran through the powered list. Even then, there are inevitable groans and declarations of "these cards all suck" when the packs are opened for peasant after playing Power and all that comes with vintage cube.
As for Ring Tempting, I think a card like Samwise is probably good enough even without the ring text. I imagine the reason we don't see people playing these cards is two-fold. One, there's just not that many options that are good enough on their own like Samwise at the peasant rarity. Two, people tend to shy away from mechanics like this in general.
I love playing control decks but a lot of the most skill intensive games I played were aggro vs aggro match-ups. Every decision matters in those games. Moreover, you have to constantly question whether you are the beatdown or your opponent is.
As the resident guy in my group who surprises no one when I'm building mono-red after the draft, I'll second this. Admittedly, yes, sometimes the games can be a little mindless when your opponent stumbles. When your draw is awkward and your opponent makes it to turn five or six, the game really starts to become a bit complex, though. Those games certainly aren't unwinnable, but the challenge is there. You have to navigate where throw your burn and removal spells or when to swing and lose a couple creatures just to get a few damage in. When you're facing down the other aggro deck at the table, your decisions are so important. Are you on the play? Can you start applying pressure or do you need to hold back and deal with their threats? I've been playing aggro since the days of Sligh and Hatred in Standard and I think it's pretty far from braindead easy-mode.
By the way, what's the legend for the google doc? Our names are sometimes bold, italic and/or in a yellow square.
I missed this part of your post earlier. The different formatting is mostly for me. I just copy/pasted my Excel doc to Google Sheets. The cubes list are all the cubes I originally pulled. The yellow highlighted ones are cubes that I actually used for data. Italic cubers were included last year. Bold cubers are MTGS users.
Clarion Spirit - At least once is a fair average. It's not as hard as you'd think to cast this on two, untap, and cast a one and another two on three. Bolt a thing, play another bear; Cast a cantrip, play another bear, etc. It's not gonna trigger every turn, but if you get a couple tokens off it, I think it's worth the slot.
Riftwing Cloudskate - Cloudskate is good, but it's not great. It's a two drop that provides some inevitability and forces your opponent to really consider the consequences of their play timing. It's also another decent inclusion in blink decks.
Lord Skitter's Butcher - I had this in for a bit, but it never saw play and I just cut it after doing the ranking to give Yahenni a shot.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel - I don't run Gary and prefer Shriekmaw, Konrad, and Vamp Sovereign over it. Gary isn't bad, but I think there's a lot of nostalgia taking part in his popularity. I just think other options at five are better and more impactful. The vampire does basically the same thing Gary does, but comes attached to a 3/4 flyer instead of a vanilla 2/4.
Sling-Gang Lieutenant - I have never ran Sling-Gang and have never understood the appeal. I like creatures that come in and make more bodies, but I think the 1/1 stats and the sac outlet only being for goblins is unattractive for a 4 drop, especially given the other options we have today.
Troll of Khazad-dûm - It is time to make the swap. Troll is great. Cheaper cycling cost alone is worth it. Cycle on one, Exhume on two, profit.
Bloodchief's Thirst - Thirst hits about 90 or so targets in my cube, not counting tokens, for a single black. Having that plus the option to scale up if needed makes it worth it for me.
Bone Shards, Village Rites, Deadly Dispute - These aren't sac outlets, they are insurance policies. Village Rites especially, given that it only costs a single black. There's also just a ton of fodder lying around that you can turn into card advantage.
The Eldest Reborn - It is slow, but it's not an aggro card, it's a control card. By the time this gets cast - at least, in my experience - the control deck has either established dominance or is on the cusp of it. It's also like Riftwing in that it forces your opponent to be really thoughtful about how they sequence their plays and potentially upsets a game plan just by sitting on the table. I was a slow adopter, but I've been pleased with it.
RE: Sacrifice Payoffs
At 360 I'm running them all except for Falkenrath Noble. That's possibly just because I love (LOVE) the sacrifice deck, but the deck is powerful when it comes together. When all of the cards in your deck either sacrifice for value, come back from the yard, and/or provide a payoff for sacrificing/dying the synergy can be near unbeatable. I think I'd run as many of these at two or less mana as I can get and possibly even one or two more at three if we see them printed in black or red.
Still a valid point worth making. I'll second everything AWD said here. This is just interesting data and it in no way means that what you've decided to do with your personal list is in any way incorrect. There could certainly be arguments made about this card over that card, but if you choose not to include or to include a specific card - despite its ranking on this yearly list - that is a testament to what you and your cubers enjoy playing.
Plagued Rusalka (7 lists) - Yeah, this is a pet card. I just adore this one and it takes me back to CHK-RAV Hand-in-Hand lists.
Nostalgia is a hell of a drug. The Rusalka is sweet and interesting card to play with. It doesn't make the list anymore but it's definitely still a cool card and if you enjoy playing with it over the 1mv options in black, then you should.
Now - Let's talk about some cards.
Qasali Pridemage (14 lists) - This surprised me slightly, although I admit I find Selesnya to be hard to pin down. (I don't count hybrid as guild). Again, the small cube means you see the busted artifacts/enchantments more often, so this might be more valuable for me? I can see this becoming anything though.
Pridemage is still a serviceable include. I think it goes back to what I said earlier about people focusing more on specific archetype support rather than good-stuff style cards. If you look through the Selesnya section in the average list it's all about the +1/+1 counters deck and persist combo. I'm only at 3 per guild slot, but I would personally run Pridemage over several of the cards that did make the list for GW this year.
Blasting Station (10 lists) - Specifically here for the persist combo decks. I wanted a colorless sac outlet because the deck is not always the same colors. Also, a bit of nostalgia here.
Same. I'm also running Vizier of Remedies (4 lists) and Ashnod's Altar (9 lists) to support persist.
Other cards I'm running at 360 that don't make the list:
Radiant, Archangel - Possibly a pet card, but my group are fans. Serra Angel makes the cut in the list and I think Radiant is just better. Feywild Caretaker - Initiative is broken. I like broken things.
Dual Lands - As I said above, people seem to be leaning into the Thriving/Gate/Vivid cycles instead of duals. I may actually make this swap. Sensei's Divining Top - Card remains good. It can slow the game down, but we enjoy the play pattern. Pacification Array - Card is not great. Artifacts at common/uncommon are not a deep well. Mirrodin's Core - I still love this land. It just does the thing you want. Ominous Cemetery - Dr. Who card, but again, the colorless well is not deep. It's colorless removal. Strip Mine - Card is broken. Like I said, I like broken things.
I should have taken out cragsmasher yeti and gloomfang mauler anyway. They are both good cards, very good honestly, but they are not justifiably picked over oliphaunt or the troll. I would pick the yeti over something like Rorix or hearth elemental though (easily in the latter case).
In the case of one vs the other in a pack, I agree. I'd definitely take the land cycler over either of those in a pack given both as a choice. I don't think that's the right way to look at card slot options, though. The question is do you want your red sixes to be all land cyclers or do you want variety? I'd personally prefer the variety, but of course, your tastes may differ.
I'm not sure what "supporting ninjas as an archetype" means to you, but if it involved bouncing things like fairie dreamthief or spyglass siren, then I do like this.
That's basically it. It would mean your Dimir deck is focused on ninjas with an aggro/tempo plan. I've always thought the archetype looked really fun, but I've never pulled the trigger on trying to make it happen in my own list.
I've included Bombardiers in my low power list mostly because I have a big artifact aggro/sacrifice them in Rakdos. It may end up being a bit too powerful for that cube, though, and make it's way into my powered list instead. It's making quite the splash in Legacy and proved to be tough to even get one ordered at a decent price.
It feels a bit sacrilegious to cut Vortex since it's been such a cube staple for so long, but given where cube is nowadays, that swap probably makes sense. My how far we've come.
I cut Palace Jailer, the other good monarch cards, and the good curses (Curse of Disturbance, Curse of Shallow Graves, Curse of Predation) for power reasons a while ago. I did not like the play patterns those cards encouraged. Conversely, a card like Glimmerpoint Stag is fine. Its still a solid value play as a 4 mana 3/3 that rebuys an ETB. Not surprised to see that a decent number of people still run it.
As for Gut, True Soul Zealot, I still run it, but I know several others have cut it for power reasons. I just haven't seen it be problematic in my environment yet, but I also run a lot of efficient instant speed removal.
First, just to clarify, I wasn't trying to say that Stag is in any way bad. It's the highest ran white four and, I think, for good reason. The card is great. I just find it quite interesting that peasant cubers, especially here on MTGS, tend to ban cards for power level reasons. Monarch, Initiative, the Curses, Skullclamp, Top, etc all see very little play here. From my perspective, I want my own peasant cube to be as powerful as possible without breaking rarity restrictions. The only true uncommons that I've "banned" are Sol Ring, which is essentially just a piece of power, and Force of Will, which is honestly borderline and I could see it making the cut. Others that I don't run are the technical uncommons from the early days of Magic like Sylvan Library and even City of Brass. I've always known these cards as rares, even having started playing in 97, so it just doesn't feel right to include them.
As for the Dr. Who cards, I don't run them right now mainly because I don't know the IP, don't like the art, and don't really need an even better, wordier Charging Monstrosaur. I could see my opinion shifting over time if these catch on with the community as a whole though or if my players ask for it.
This is interesting as well. Not to say that you're in any way wrong for it, just that - for me - I want to run the best cards, even if I'm not a fan of the IP or don't like the art. (And I agree, the Dr. Who art is mostly not great.) I think Dr. Who, in general, was just a strange IP to collaborate with for Magic and made a lot less sense than 40K and LotR. I imagine Final Fantasy and Fallout will feel similar in 2024.
I don't currently have any rare lands, but am strongly considering breaking rarity for them. Until that happens, I will continue running the vivid/thriving/gate package over specific etb duals. Would specific etb duals make the draft a little more interesting? Probably. But, about half of my playgroup is newer to draft and cube in general and I try to set things up so that they end up with functional decks and good mana.
I may also make the swap from two color duals to the Vivid/Thriving/Gate package. I'm already running the Thriving lands (which I learned in this project are now available in foil), so it's not a stretch or huge swap to make that change. I understand why peasant cubers include rare duals. Having all your dual lands ETB tapped can be a bit of a bummer, but IMO, that's part of the attraction to the format. When you're playing retail limited, you don't have mana fixing the same as you do in powered cube. I want my peasant cube environment to feel like powered up retail limited. I want fixing to be available, but I want it to match the rest of the cube. I toyed with including pain lands a few years back, but ultimately cut them. I think we could realistically get some decent fixing at uncommon (see the recent duals printed in SOI on Arena), but we'll never get fixing like Shocks, so it just doesn't make sense to me to include lands like that in peasant cube.
I had a very cool deck with Wishclaw Talisman where I would tutor for Oppposition Agent, then snatch my opponent's search. I've found that flash is a VERY underrated ability and I'm revisiting all cubable options.
This sounds like a very specific synergy that wouldn't come up very often. Not to mention that Wishclaw, in general, is a fringe card itself. If you look at Agent in the grand scheme of cube and the commonly ran library searchers, you're looking more at fetch lands, green ramp spells, and tutors. Stealing that search with Agent can certainly be a powerful disruptive play, but it being three mana was a huge negative. Flash creatures shouldn't be underrated, but I'm not running Hired Blade just because it can be flashed in at EOT, which is what Agent ended up being more often than not.
The problem I had is 3/3 just isn't good enough in this format IMO as s 3-drop; 3 toughness is too small to block effectively and isn't big enough to go on the offensive.
While I do agree with this to some extent, you have to evaluate creatures on more than just stats alone. Even if you compare the two based solely on their stats, you're comparing a 3/3 to a 3/2, which has the Trespasser coming out on top. In addition Trespasser is harder to deal with due to the ward and flips into a 4/4. I also think Trespasser has a much more consistent disruptive ability with the graveyard hate getting increasingly more relevant in today's cube environments and the life gain is nothing to sneeze at.
The only bad thing the Trespasser has going for it is the god-awful Day/Night mechanic. Full disclosure, I'm not running Trespasser and this is the only reason why. Keeping track of Day/Night in paper is such a distracting pain in the neck and it's so easy to forget.
I went looking to see if I was the one guy running any of the ~1600 cards with only one rep, and I was for quite a few!
Not including rares that aren't specifically for fixing makes sense in a format that's by design a format for commons and uncommons. As to the others in your list, if you look at the cards that did make it, I think it's fair to say that they are just outclassed at this point. Take Cragsmasher Yeti, for example. The card isn't bad by any stretch, but if I wanted a land cycler that doubles as a big finisher, Oliphaunt is just an objectively better option. If I'm just looking for a good red six, both Amethyst Dragon and Hearth Elemental are also versatile options that aren't just sitting in your hand waiting for you to get to six. And if you're just looking for a big red beater, we now have Rorix to fill that role. With all that said, Oliphaunt (and friends) was probably the nail in the coffin for a lot of the good high cost land cyclers that came before them.
A lot of the same things can be said when comparing the other cards on your list to the cards that did make it. The ninja is decent, but unless I'm actively supporting ninjas as an archetype, I'd rather fill my black five drop slots with cards like Syr Konrad, Shriekmaw, and Vampire Sovereign. Even if you count it as a four, we've now got cards like Gonti and Sanguinary Priest that want to occupy that space.
Cards I'm surprised didn't get more attention:
- Lulu, Loyal Hollyphant (13 cubes) - While not an auto-include in any one archetype, Lulu synergizes with several existing archetypes: +1/+1 counters, blink, flying. It's played even better than I hoped - in a draft just last week, my son had it in play with Mother of Runes, Poison Dart Frog, and Imperious Perfect (among others), and he dominated the board, negating my removal, cranking out multiple tokens each turn, all while growing his creatures and and applying lots of pressure (he kept getting triggers thanks to things like Springbloom Druid and the fact that I had to block in order to live).
- Loran's Escape (5 cubes) - Like Blacksmith's Skill (1 cube), this is a cheap, effective piece of interaction that can protect a creature or artifact for a single mana. I've never been disappointed to draw this.
- Vampire of the Dire Moon (7 cubes) - I know it's been out for several years, but I'm still amazed this doesn't get run more.
- Promising Vein (5 cubes) - Shire Terrace landed in 17 cubes, yet this near-functional reprint got nearly no attention at all. Maybe more people avoid functional reprints than I realized.
For me a lot of these come down to both space and personal preference. Lulu does synergize with blink, but it's also a bit of a nombo since you don't want to blink the cards you're putting counters on. Loran's Escape and Promising Vein are both probably just space reasons. Do I need two versions of a slow fetch at 360/450? Probably not, honestly. I do like the Vampire, but I think people are moving more toward sac fodder in the black 1-drop slot. If those slots were still being occupied by aggressive one drops like Carnophage and Lacerator for most cubes, I think the Vampire would be a slam dunk.
I think there's a lot going on with the Thraben Inspector popularity. First, it's honestly just a decent 1-drop in white that does more than just attack for two. It's good in both the aggressive decks providing a body to turn sideways and a little card advantage later. It's also good in the midrange and control decks for being a decent blocker as a 1/2, providing that same card advantage, and also synergizing with artifact strategies. Beyond that, there's quite the stigma around Thraben in the general cube community. People like JBro, Emma Partlow, and LSV all hype the Inspector. Having people with prominent followings talking about how good a card is can be the best advertisement for a card. Additionally, like you said, the card is fantastic in vintage and legacy style cubes. When cards can perform well at a higher power level, but also just happen to be legal in a lower power format, it's only natural to want to include it there as well.
Swiftspear is a little different. Not only do we not get the wealth of red one drops that rare cubes get, but it's just one of the best options, even compared to the rare one drop options. Red aggressive decks are naturally going to cast non-creature spells to pump it with burn, enchantments, and equipment. And that's not mention how well it performs in spells matter style decks.
With all that said, there are also cards that fall further down the list than I think they should. How is Glimmerpoint Stag ranked above Palace Jailer? Why aren't more people running the brokenness that is Curse of Disturbance or Gut? The Dr. Who cards like Iraxxa and Sontaran General fell much further down that I thought they would. It also seems like people that aren't opting to include rare fixing are moving away for the ETB tapped duals in favor of more versatile ETB tapped options like the Thriving lands, Gates, and Vivids.
On paper Opposition Agent looked bananas. In practice, though, it was mostly just a 3/2 for three. It's tough to hold up 3 waiting on your opponent to crack a fetch. I would include Trespasser well before I was in the market for Agent.
If you're interested it parsing the rest of the cards, I uploaded those to a dregs list. It's over 3K cards, so I didn't take the time to tag them, but you can compare to the Google sheet if you want to see where a card fell in the ranking.
I've been browsing through the data from the average cube this year and I've found it interesting to see cards that were once considered peasant staples included in so few cubes now. Calciderm specifically is only in seven out of the 95 cubes sampled. Orzhov Advokist isn't there at all.
I did everything I could to remove the duplicates before compiling. Most duplicates were in the lands section, so it was fairly easy to spot.
RE: Anafenza - Despite the WW cost, Anafenza is great from multiple angels. She helps make your smaller dorks comparable against other decks and she's a perfect include if you want to support persist combo.
There was an on camera match during CubeCon that really showcased Anafenza in Emma Partlow's peasant list.
@A_WasherDryer - What are the two names? It's too late to fix it now, but I can make note for next year.
Seems strange to me that as we get more and better peasant options, more people choose to stretch beyond peasant into peasant+. I would be curious how much this was affected by expanding the list of cubes the data is drawn from. No judgment, though - cube is the format to do whatever you want. I've always been satisfied with the fixing at peasant level and will stick to it.
It's probably a factor of the cubes surveyed, though a large portion of those were also included last year. I ran pain lands in my peasant list years ago, but it just seems odd to me to break the rarity. I ended up cutting them because it just didn't feel right. There were a few cubes included that were running a full suite of shocks and fetches, which just goes against the spirit of the format to me.
I think we've gotten some decent options at peasant recently, even if they still ETB tapped. I am running the SOI lands that were recently downshifted on Arena. Even that feels a little off to me with them not ever being printed at uncommon in paper, but it makes more sense than including the full powered cube suite of fixing.
The rules I used for inclusion:
Must be updated through LCI (with a full update - one Geological Appraiser didn't count)
Must be regularly updated (if not with each set release, at least a few times a year to bring the cube up to speed)
I know this is technically a CubeCobra average peasant list, but a large chunk of those lists are from regular MTGS users. Since the project stems from this forum, I think MTGS Average still makes sense.
One thing to note is that because CubeCobra only offers a specific number of color coding options for tags, I had to tag by tens instead of the normal fives. This doesn't really change much until you get to the more fringe choices in larger cubes, but I thought it worth mentioning. If your choice is close, you can always get the exact numbers from the Google doc.
The first thing that stood out to me this year is that Shock Lands made their way into the average list. I guess more and more people are updating their mana bases to include rare lands. Last year I think there were a couple random rare duals that made it in, but I cut them from the list before uploading since it was weird to have just one or two. All ten shocks were there this year, so they're also in the list.
While browsing the finished list, the next thing I noticed is just how good Lord of the Rings was to cubes of all shapes and sizes. What a great cube set.
The last thing that popped out at me is how people are leaning into archetype support rather than just good commons and uncommons. I see lots of support for self-mill and graveyard strategies, persist combo, and some others. Very cool to see.
I'm sure there's a ton of data comparison between last year's list and this year's, but I'm spent so I'll let others do that if they're so inclined.
Anyway, happy holidays, friends, and I hope this list is useful for you. May 2024 give you all many chances to cube!
Ok, friends. I have begun the fun part (for me), which is the data mining. Out of the 159 total cubes polled, 95 have been updated through LCI. 95 is still quite a bit more data than we've had for previous years, so I'm thinking about just excluding non-LCI cubes. It's been just over a month since release, so there's been plenty of time to get those updates in.
I'll leave it up to the community, though. Should I go ahead and include the rest? They are all updated through WOE, so while LCI will be under represented, the year of peasant cube in general will be there.
lol - I feel this so much. I have multiple cubes and the powered vintage list is by far "the cube". When the guys come over for cube, that's the one they expect to come out first. The others I've built tend to be the ones we draft once we've ran through the powered list. Even then, there are inevitable groans and declarations of "these cards all suck" when the packs are opened for peasant after playing Power and all that comes with vintage cube.
As for Ring Tempting, I think a card like Samwise is probably good enough even without the ring text. I imagine the reason we don't see people playing these cards is two-fold. One, there's just not that many options that are good enough on their own like Samwise at the peasant rarity. Two, people tend to shy away from mechanics like this in general.
As the resident guy in my group who surprises no one when I'm building mono-red after the draft, I'll second this. Admittedly, yes, sometimes the games can be a little mindless when your opponent stumbles. When your draw is awkward and your opponent makes it to turn five or six, the game really starts to become a bit complex, though. Those games certainly aren't unwinnable, but the challenge is there. You have to navigate where throw your burn and removal spells or when to swing and lose a couple creatures just to get a few damage in. When you're facing down the other aggro deck at the table, your decisions are so important. Are you on the play? Can you start applying pressure or do you need to hold back and deal with their threats? I've been playing aggro since the days of Sligh and Hatred in Standard and I think it's pretty far from braindead easy-mode.
I missed this part of your post earlier. The different formatting is mostly for me. I just copy/pasted my Excel doc to Google Sheets. The cubes list are all the cubes I originally pulled. The yellow highlighted ones are cubes that I actually used for data. Italic cubers were included last year. Bold cubers are MTGS users.
Clarion Spirit - At least once is a fair average. It's not as hard as you'd think to cast this on two, untap, and cast a one and another two on three. Bolt a thing, play another bear; Cast a cantrip, play another bear, etc. It's not gonna trigger every turn, but if you get a couple tokens off it, I think it's worth the slot.
Riftwing Cloudskate - Cloudskate is good, but it's not great. It's a two drop that provides some inevitability and forces your opponent to really consider the consequences of their play timing. It's also another decent inclusion in blink decks.
Lord Skitter's Butcher - I had this in for a bit, but it never saw play and I just cut it after doing the ranking to give Yahenni a shot.
Gray Merchant of Asphodel - I don't run Gary and prefer Shriekmaw, Konrad, and Vamp Sovereign over it. Gary isn't bad, but I think there's a lot of nostalgia taking part in his popularity. I just think other options at five are better and more impactful. The vampire does basically the same thing Gary does, but comes attached to a 3/4 flyer instead of a vanilla 2/4.
Sling-Gang Lieutenant - I have never ran Sling-Gang and have never understood the appeal. I like creatures that come in and make more bodies, but I think the 1/1 stats and the sac outlet only being for goblins is unattractive for a 4 drop, especially given the other options we have today.
Troll of Khazad-dûm - It is time to make the swap. Troll is great. Cheaper cycling cost alone is worth it. Cycle on one, Exhume on two, profit.
Bloodchief's Thirst - Thirst hits about 90 or so targets in my cube, not counting tokens, for a single black. Having that plus the option to scale up if needed makes it worth it for me.
Bone Shards, Village Rites, Deadly Dispute - These aren't sac outlets, they are insurance policies. Village Rites especially, given that it only costs a single black. There's also just a ton of fodder lying around that you can turn into card advantage.
The Eldest Reborn - It is slow, but it's not an aggro card, it's a control card. By the time this gets cast - at least, in my experience - the control deck has either established dominance or is on the cusp of it. It's also like Riftwing in that it forces your opponent to be really thoughtful about how they sequence their plays and potentially upsets a game plan just by sitting on the table. I was a slow adopter, but I've been pleased with it.
RE: Sacrifice Payoffs
At 360 I'm running them all except for Falkenrath Noble. That's possibly just because I love (LOVE) the sacrifice deck, but the deck is powerful when it comes together. When all of the cards in your deck either sacrifice for value, come back from the yard, and/or provide a payoff for sacrificing/dying the synergy can be near unbeatable. I think I'd run as many of these at two or less mana as I can get and possibly even one or two more at three if we see them printed in black or red.
Still a valid point worth making. I'll second everything AWD said here. This is just interesting data and it in no way means that what you've decided to do with your personal list is in any way incorrect. There could certainly be arguments made about this card over that card, but if you choose not to include or to include a specific card - despite its ranking on this yearly list - that is a testament to what you and your cubers enjoy playing.
Case in point:
Nostalgia is a hell of a drug. The Rusalka is sweet and interesting card to play with. It doesn't make the list anymore but it's definitely still a cool card and if you enjoy playing with it over the 1mv options in black, then you should.
Now - Let's talk about some cards.
Pridemage is still a serviceable include. I think it goes back to what I said earlier about people focusing more on specific archetype support rather than good-stuff style cards. If you look through the Selesnya section in the average list it's all about the +1/+1 counters deck and persist combo. I'm only at 3 per guild slot, but I would personally run Pridemage over several of the cards that did make the list for GW this year.
Same. I'm also running Vizier of Remedies (4 lists) and Ashnod's Altar (9 lists) to support persist.
Other cards I'm running at 360 that don't make the list:
Radiant, Archangel - Possibly a pet card, but my group are fans. Serra Angel makes the cut in the list and I think Radiant is just better.
Feywild Caretaker - Initiative is broken. I like broken things.
Dual Lands - As I said above, people seem to be leaning into the Thriving/Gate/Vivid cycles instead of duals. I may actually make this swap.
Sensei's Divining Top - Card remains good. It can slow the game down, but we enjoy the play pattern.
Pacification Array - Card is not great. Artifacts at common/uncommon are not a deep well.
Mirrodin's Core - I still love this land. It just does the thing you want.
Ominous Cemetery - Dr. Who card, but again, the colorless well is not deep. It's colorless removal.
Strip Mine - Card is broken. Like I said, I like broken things.
In the case of one vs the other in a pack, I agree. I'd definitely take the land cycler over either of those in a pack given both as a choice. I don't think that's the right way to look at card slot options, though. The question is do you want your red sixes to be all land cyclers or do you want variety? I'd personally prefer the variety, but of course, your tastes may differ.
That's basically it. It would mean your Dimir deck is focused on ninjas with an aggro/tempo plan. I've always thought the archetype looked really fun, but I've never pulled the trigger on trying to make it happen in my own list.
For reference: Scryfall Peasant Legal Ninjutsu Cards
It feels a bit sacrilegious to cut Vortex since it's been such a cube staple for so long, but given where cube is nowadays, that swap probably makes sense. My how far we've come.
First, just to clarify, I wasn't trying to say that Stag is in any way bad. It's the highest ran white four and, I think, for good reason. The card is great. I just find it quite interesting that peasant cubers, especially here on MTGS, tend to ban cards for power level reasons. Monarch, Initiative, the Curses, Skullclamp, Top, etc all see very little play here. From my perspective, I want my own peasant cube to be as powerful as possible without breaking rarity restrictions. The only true uncommons that I've "banned" are Sol Ring, which is essentially just a piece of power, and Force of Will, which is honestly borderline and I could see it making the cut. Others that I don't run are the technical uncommons from the early days of Magic like Sylvan Library and even City of Brass. I've always known these cards as rares, even having started playing in 97, so it just doesn't feel right to include them.
This is interesting as well. Not to say that you're in any way wrong for it, just that - for me - I want to run the best cards, even if I'm not a fan of the IP or don't like the art. (And I agree, the Dr. Who art is mostly not great.) I think Dr. Who, in general, was just a strange IP to collaborate with for Magic and made a lot less sense than 40K and LotR. I imagine Final Fantasy and Fallout will feel similar in 2024.
I may also make the swap from two color duals to the Vivid/Thriving/Gate package. I'm already running the Thriving lands (which I learned in this project are now available in foil), so it's not a stretch or huge swap to make that change. I understand why peasant cubers include rare duals. Having all your dual lands ETB tapped can be a bit of a bummer, but IMO, that's part of the attraction to the format. When you're playing retail limited, you don't have mana fixing the same as you do in powered cube. I want my peasant cube environment to feel like powered up retail limited. I want fixing to be available, but I want it to match the rest of the cube. I toyed with including pain lands a few years back, but ultimately cut them. I think we could realistically get some decent fixing at uncommon (see the recent duals printed in SOI on Arena), but we'll never get fixing like Shocks, so it just doesn't make sense to me to include lands like that in peasant cube.
This sounds like a very specific synergy that wouldn't come up very often. Not to mention that Wishclaw, in general, is a fringe card itself. If you look at Agent in the grand scheme of cube and the commonly ran library searchers, you're looking more at fetch lands, green ramp spells, and tutors. Stealing that search with Agent can certainly be a powerful disruptive play, but it being three mana was a huge negative. Flash creatures shouldn't be underrated, but I'm not running Hired Blade just because it can be flashed in at EOT, which is what Agent ended up being more often than not.
While I do agree with this to some extent, you have to evaluate creatures on more than just stats alone. Even if you compare the two based solely on their stats, you're comparing a 3/3 to a 3/2, which has the Trespasser coming out on top. In addition Trespasser is harder to deal with due to the ward and flips into a 4/4. I also think Trespasser has a much more consistent disruptive ability with the graveyard hate getting increasingly more relevant in today's cube environments and the life gain is nothing to sneeze at.
The only bad thing the Trespasser has going for it is the god-awful Day/Night mechanic. Full disclosure, I'm not running Trespasser and this is the only reason why. Keeping track of Day/Night in paper is such a distracting pain in the neck and it's so easy to forget.
Not including rares that aren't specifically for fixing makes sense in a format that's by design a format for commons and uncommons. As to the others in your list, if you look at the cards that did make it, I think it's fair to say that they are just outclassed at this point. Take Cragsmasher Yeti, for example. The card isn't bad by any stretch, but if I wanted a land cycler that doubles as a big finisher, Oliphaunt is just an objectively better option. If I'm just looking for a good red six, both Amethyst Dragon and Hearth Elemental are also versatile options that aren't just sitting in your hand waiting for you to get to six. And if you're just looking for a big red beater, we now have Rorix to fill that role. With all that said, Oliphaunt (and friends) was probably the nail in the coffin for a lot of the good high cost land cyclers that came before them.
A lot of the same things can be said when comparing the other cards on your list to the cards that did make it. The ninja is decent, but unless I'm actively supporting ninjas as an archetype, I'd rather fill my black five drop slots with cards like Syr Konrad, Shriekmaw, and Vampire Sovereign. Even if you count it as a four, we've now got cards like Gonti and Sanguinary Priest that want to occupy that space.
For me a lot of these come down to both space and personal preference. Lulu does synergize with blink, but it's also a bit of a nombo since you don't want to blink the cards you're putting counters on. Loran's Escape and Promising Vein are both probably just space reasons. Do I need two versions of a slow fetch at 360/450? Probably not, honestly. I do like the Vampire, but I think people are moving more toward sac fodder in the black 1-drop slot. If those slots were still being occupied by aggressive one drops like Carnophage and Lacerator for most cubes, I think the Vampire would be a slam dunk.
I think there's a lot going on with the Thraben Inspector popularity. First, it's honestly just a decent 1-drop in white that does more than just attack for two. It's good in both the aggressive decks providing a body to turn sideways and a little card advantage later. It's also good in the midrange and control decks for being a decent blocker as a 1/2, providing that same card advantage, and also synergizing with artifact strategies. Beyond that, there's quite the stigma around Thraben in the general cube community. People like JBro, Emma Partlow, and LSV all hype the Inspector. Having people with prominent followings talking about how good a card is can be the best advertisement for a card. Additionally, like you said, the card is fantastic in vintage and legacy style cubes. When cards can perform well at a higher power level, but also just happen to be legal in a lower power format, it's only natural to want to include it there as well.
Swiftspear is a little different. Not only do we not get the wealth of red one drops that rare cubes get, but it's just one of the best options, even compared to the rare one drop options. Red aggressive decks are naturally going to cast non-creature spells to pump it with burn, enchantments, and equipment. And that's not mention how well it performs in spells matter style decks.
With all that said, there are also cards that fall further down the list than I think they should. How is Glimmerpoint Stag ranked above Palace Jailer? Why aren't more people running the brokenness that is Curse of Disturbance or Gut? The Dr. Who cards like Iraxxa and Sontaran General fell much further down that I thought they would. It also seems like people that aren't opting to include rare fixing are moving away for the ETB tapped duals in favor of more versatile ETB tapped options like the Thriving lands, Gates, and Vivids.
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/mtgsdregs23
RE: Anafenza - Despite the WW cost, Anafenza is great from multiple angels. She helps make your smaller dorks comparable against other decks and she's a perfect include if you want to support persist combo.
There was an on camera match during CubeCon that really showcased Anafenza in Emma Partlow's peasant list.
@A_WasherDryer - What are the two names? It's too late to fix it now, but I can make note for next year.
It's probably a factor of the cubes surveyed, though a large portion of those were also included last year. I ran pain lands in my peasant list years ago, but it just seems odd to me to break the rarity. I ended up cutting them because it just didn't feel right. There were a few cubes included that were running a full suite of shocks and fetches, which just goes against the spirit of the format to me.
I think we've gotten some decent options at peasant recently, even if they still ETB tapped. I am running the SOI lands that were recently downshifted on Arena. Even that feels a little off to me with them not ever being printed at uncommon in paper, but it makes more sense than including the full powered cube suite of fixing.
EDIT: I also fixed the links.
First, the links:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1aGNGVQPoxwybJxJRrLjpzXQsQwgYbatSw-JxPvi-tRY/edit?usp=sharing
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/mtgs2023
The rules I used for inclusion:
Must be updated through LCI (with a full update - one Geological Appraiser didn't count)
Must be regularly updated (if not with each set release, at least a few times a year to bring the cube up to speed)
I know this is technically a CubeCobra average peasant list, but a large chunk of those lists are from regular MTGS users. Since the project stems from this forum, I think MTGS Average still makes sense.
One thing to note is that because CubeCobra only offers a specific number of color coding options for tags, I had to tag by tens instead of the normal fives. This doesn't really change much until you get to the more fringe choices in larger cubes, but I thought it worth mentioning. If your choice is close, you can always get the exact numbers from the Google doc.
The first thing that stood out to me this year is that Shock Lands made their way into the average list. I guess more and more people are updating their mana bases to include rare lands. Last year I think there were a couple random rare duals that made it in, but I cut them from the list before uploading since it was weird to have just one or two. All ten shocks were there this year, so they're also in the list.
While browsing the finished list, the next thing I noticed is just how good Lord of the Rings was to cubes of all shapes and sizes. What a great cube set.
The last thing that popped out at me is how people are leaning into archetype support rather than just good commons and uncommons. I see lots of support for self-mill and graveyard strategies, persist combo, and some others. Very cool to see.
I'm sure there's a ton of data comparison between last year's list and this year's, but I'm spent so I'll let others do that if they're so inclined.
Anyway, happy holidays, friends, and I hope this list is useful for you. May 2024 give you all many chances to cube!
I'll leave it up to the community, though. Should I go ahead and include the rest? They are all updated through WOE, so while LCI will be under represented, the year of peasant cube in general will be there.