Never seemed to have as much luck with Collective Brutality in our playgroup as the rest of you all seemed to. In looking for a discard card to cut for Fugue, that's the only one that seems possible for us. Opinions?
That's quite a change! I thought I'd leave some thoughts and questions I had after reading over everything - if you aren't looking for this kind of feedback/engagement on the changes feel free to ignore this. But it seemed like a good opportunity for me to learn some things about some cards I've overlooked or to re-evaluate some of the choices in my own cube through the lens of this slimmer 450 wtwlf123 list!
Very surprised to see Wishclaw Talisman still kicking around! This is one I may need to give a second look. I thought it was mostly there to be cute with blink effects like Aminatou, but given that it has still stuck around even in this slimmer list, I have to ask if there is something more to it than that I have been missing.
Also interesting to see Magus of the Order make the cut at the smaller size. I guess that means that card has really been working out for you - another I should take a second look at!
No more Mirari's Wake! Very sad - I get it though; I've been thinking about cutting this one myself lately. I feel it is getting harder to justify even though its another one of my favorite cards for old time's sake.
I notice you kept Abrupt Decay over Assassin's Trophy. Do you generally like decay more? I went the other way myself and would be interested in hearing the reasoning behind that choice!
I assume there is a method to the madness of which guilds got Talismans and which got Signets? As someone who switched over to the Talismans wholesale once Modern Horizons dropped and hasn't looked back, I'm eager to hear what you have to say on this as well.
As rantipole pointed out, it's notable (and I will say jokingly say admirable!) that you have kept so much of the guild fixing lands. You are currently running one more each at 450 than I am running in my 540 cube... and my heart tells me I should be running more fixing. It's just so hard to find the cuts.
What's more interesting to me about the land section is the lack of so many of the manlands! As someone who was a proponent of them for awhile I am surprised to see them mostly gone. Do you simply feel that the etb tapped lands are too slow for today's manabases to be worth it, or is there another reason that they have gone by the wayside here I am missing?
This is definitely a big change, and hopefully it is an exciting one for you and your playgroup. I look forward to seeing how this smaller 450 list evolves from here on out.
Wow, this is great! Can't wait to get this one into the cube. It's always nice when there's an easy cut for something - this will replace Skymarcher Aspirant for us!
This card reminds me of Exalted Angel, with this card's mode of foretelling for two and casting for 3 mirroring the Exalted Anegl's mode of morphing for 3 and then casting for 4. Exalted Angel was a card we liked running but ended up just barely being squeezed out by other white four drops that were released. The additional flexibility of the scaling XX mode to make more than one creature and the turn faster clock on the beatdown for making the single 4/4 in the case it was foretold on turn 2 might just be enough to consider finding room for again, even if we could not for Exalted Angel anymore.
I also think the comparisons to Serra the Benevolent are interesting. You get basically the same thing for the same cost the turn you hardcast this as you do with the typical case of playing Serra and downticking her. With Serra, you also leave behind a 1 loyalty planeswalker that can threaten to make more angels later if not dealt with. With this, the upside is instead in the flexibility of the foretell -> 3 drop angel mode + the flexibility to make multiple angels at once if you spend more mana. Serra was another card we were happy with but recently cut to try out Court of Grace.
Overall, the fact that this card compares favorably or at least around equal to other cube cards we liked makes us interested to try it. Not sure what to cut for it - it'd have to be either Court of Grace, which we've been having success with, or maybe Finale of Glory as a similar "army in a can" type of card. Ultimately I am not sure this really fills the army in a can roll well enough, but it could be worth trying out over the court for us. Definitely keeping my eye on this one!
Thanks for the responses everyone - I am going to try it out instead of one of my 2cc ramp creatures in green (probably instead of Tangled Florahedron) rather than in the place of another 1cc ramp creature, based on the responses here that mostly seem in agreement that goose is good but not better than any of the traditional 1 drop dorks I already run. Once we've had a chance to see what it feels like to play with it, I'll report back what my thoughts are on whether that was a good trade to make in order to get him into my cube or not!
Thanks everyone for the detailed responses! I appreciate the help in filling me in about this archetype. I'll have to think more on whether I want to try to find room in my cube for the more specific cards mentioned above or not, but this definitely helped point me in the right direction of what kinds of things to include if I did decide to try out this archetype!
We cubed Glorybringer for a bit but ultimately weren't that happy with him. We cut him and haven't looked back - especially now that Ilharg, the Raze-Boar has been printed.
Siege-Gang just does more stuff, at least in our cube. One removal spell takes out the whole Glorybringer - not true for Siege-Gang. It also plays great with all sorts of other archetype cards - Purphoros, God of the Forge/Impact Tremors effects, Alesha, Who Smiles at Death/Reveillark style power-based reanimation, Grumgully, the Generous-style cards that reward creatures etb-ing with counters, etc, etc. The list goes on. Its really hard to find things that it DOESN'T have some great synergy with, which is just not true for Glorybringer.
I guess that means the floor might be a bit higher for Glorybringer but the ceiling is way lower... and I am not even sure if I agree with that statement myself, as the floor for Siege-Gang is still quite high.
Interesting to see how positive the reaction is here. As with all things cube, the painful part is to find a cut... is it worth cutting one of the one mana dorks in order to have a more diverse group of one mana accelerants? Or is it the case that, despite the positivity, I should still be looking elsewhere for a cut if I am trying to include it.
Hey everyone! I did not see an archetype thread for Simic Flash, but it is an archetype I have increasingly seen mentioned here and there as of late. I wanted to create a thread in order to see what exactly it's all about, and see what I was missing.
Please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems like the "archetype" is simply creatures in blue and green that have Flash (or can otherwise be used on the opponent's turn in some way). This pairs well with blue counterspells and instant speed removal spells because you can keep all of your mana open when passing to an opponent's turn but still use all of that mana in their end step by flashing in creatures at instant speed. Is there more to this archetype, or does that about summarize it?
If that summary is correct, the there does not seem to be any central cards that specifically reward flashing things in... aside from maybe Nightpack Ambusher. It seems like rather than being built around some critical supporting cards, this is an archetype that can be supported just by making sure your cube has a critical mass of flashable creatures in it. In looking at my own cube and some other lists, I am seeing the following commonly run flash creatures:
Is that set of cards really enough to support a Simic Flash archetype? Currently, in my personal 540 cube, I run all of the above but Torrential Gearhulk and Great Oak Guardian. If including these two cards would be enough to push this critical mass over the edge and make Simic Flash a supported archetype by proxy, I would be interested in doing that - but I have no experience with building for this archetype, so I was hoping to hear from someone who did.
I know I used to also run Mystic Snake which has been squeezed out of my cube by the absurd simic cards printed in recent years, but that card (and its cousin Frilled Mystic) seem like they could also work here, especially as a signpost card that this is a supported archetype. I've also seen Bounding Krasis thrown around, which is another card that works with twin as well as being a flash card for this archetype, just like Great Oak Guardian.
I am very interested to hear what people have to say about this archetype and what things I may be missing!
How is this goose looking as we enter 2021? I still see him pop up in lists and will admit I never tried him myself.
Do the people running him generally like him more, as much, or less than other one drop ramp spells? He looks to me like the next best 1 drop "elf" to add after all the traditional 1 mana mana dorks, but it does not seem worth cutting any of them for him to me when he only works every other turn or so. Which means for my 540 cube, he is currently on tbe outside looking in, although I'm still interested to hear what people think.
540 Powered Cube here. We've been having success with this. Its a great card to play after a balance or other board wipe. Refilling the hand with extra card draw while you make 4/4 fliers has been the default mode of the card when cast. It DOES feel absurd when it works, and steve_man's quote from above is inline with how its played out for us.
While I am sure there have been less visible times where it has languished in the hand because it is not great when behind on board presence, it has been a powerful way for non-blue white decks to break through the duldrums of a stalled board or seal a game while they are ahead.I also like that it helps diversify the threats in white a bit by being an enchantment instead of a planeswalker, which at this point is almost harder to remove anyway.
We will keep an eye on just how often it performs vs languishes but at least so far for us we have found it to be a pretty good cube card. We've found that what it provides to white (outlined above) has outweighed its weakness when behind enough to be included in our cube.
For what its worth this is the only of these monarch enchantments we found good enough to run for us.
Hey wtwlf - I was glancing through your cube again today and noticed you were currently running each of the Lightning Strike versions but you weren't running Magma Jet anymore. When I asked about those two cards a few months ago I felt like you gave a pretty good argument in favor of having Jet over Strike, so I was just curious - has your evaluation changed, or is there something about your current cube configuration that made you choose Strike over Jet?
I also found the limitation of only hitting an instant to be cumbersome on occasion.
I actually completely forgot about that myself, having not played with the card in a year and a half or so... I was definitely picturing it as instant or sorcery in my mind. That is a tad unfortunate even if you will mostly be wanting to cast instants with it.
I missed some of the discussion that happened a few days ago that touched on Aetherling - surprised people seem so down on it. In my 540 powered I only have room for two blue 6 drops at the moment, and I went with Aetherling and Consecrated Sphinx. I am not currently running Gearhulk... although I did at some point in the past.
In general, do people like Gearhulk better than Aetherling these days? I must say after reading these comments on Aetherling I am tempted to switch back. I like the fact that Gearhulk is an artifact which helps the artifact decks and also that it's value comes in the form of an etb - we've had a lot of good blink enablers lately like the new Thassa and it could be fun to add some support on the top end there.
Never seemed to have as much luck with Collective Brutality in our playgroup as the rest of you all seemed to. In looking for a discard card to cut for Fugue, that's the only one that seems possible for us. Opinions?
This is definitely a big change, and hopefully it is an exciting one for you and your playgroup. I look forward to seeing how this smaller 450 list evolves from here on out.
I also think the comparisons to Serra the Benevolent are interesting. You get basically the same thing for the same cost the turn you hardcast this as you do with the typical case of playing Serra and downticking her. With Serra, you also leave behind a 1 loyalty planeswalker that can threaten to make more angels later if not dealt with. With this, the upside is instead in the flexibility of the foretell -> 3 drop angel mode + the flexibility to make multiple angels at once if you spend more mana. Serra was another card we were happy with but recently cut to try out Court of Grace.
Overall, the fact that this card compares favorably or at least around equal to other cube cards we liked makes us interested to try it. Not sure what to cut for it - it'd have to be either Court of Grace, which we've been having success with, or maybe Finale of Glory as a similar "army in a can" type of card. Ultimately I am not sure this really fills the army in a can roll well enough, but it could be worth trying out over the court for us. Definitely keeping my eye on this one!
Siege-Gang just does more stuff, at least in our cube. One removal spell takes out the whole Glorybringer - not true for Siege-Gang. It also plays great with all sorts of other archetype cards - Purphoros, God of the Forge/Impact Tremors effects, Alesha, Who Smiles at Death/Reveillark style power-based reanimation, Grumgully, the Generous-style cards that reward creatures etb-ing with counters, etc, etc. The list goes on. Its really hard to find things that it DOESN'T have some great synergy with, which is just not true for Glorybringer.
I guess that means the floor might be a bit higher for Glorybringer but the ceiling is way lower... and I am not even sure if I agree with that statement myself, as the floor for Siege-Gang is still quite high.
Interesting to see how positive the reaction is here. As with all things cube, the painful part is to find a cut... is it worth cutting one of the one mana dorks in order to have a more diverse group of one mana accelerants? Or is it the case that, despite the positivity, I should still be looking elsewhere for a cut if I am trying to include it.
Please correct me if I am wrong, but it seems like the "archetype" is simply creatures in blue and green that have Flash (or can otherwise be used on the opponent's turn in some way). This pairs well with blue counterspells and instant speed removal spells because you can keep all of your mana open when passing to an opponent's turn but still use all of that mana in their end step by flashing in creatures at instant speed. Is there more to this archetype, or does that about summarize it?
If that summary is correct, the there does not seem to be any central cards that specifically reward flashing things in... aside from maybe Nightpack Ambusher. It seems like rather than being built around some critical supporting cards, this is an archetype that can be supported just by making sure your cube has a critical mass of flashable creatures in it. In looking at my own cube and some other lists, I am seeing the following commonly run flash creatures:
C
Ancient Stone Idol
G
Nightpack Ambusher
Great Oak Guardian
U
Snapcaster Mage
Brazen Borrower
Vendilion Clique
Venser, Shaper Savant
Torrential Gearhulk
Hullbreacher
Cubes that also support the Splinter Twin combo additionally provide these as flash creatures as well:
Pestermite
Deceiver Exarch
Is that set of cards really enough to support a Simic Flash archetype? Currently, in my personal 540 cube, I run all of the above but Torrential Gearhulk and Great Oak Guardian. If including these two cards would be enough to push this critical mass over the edge and make Simic Flash a supported archetype by proxy, I would be interested in doing that - but I have no experience with building for this archetype, so I was hoping to hear from someone who did.
I know I used to also run Mystic Snake which has been squeezed out of my cube by the absurd simic cards printed in recent years, but that card (and its cousin Frilled Mystic) seem like they could also work here, especially as a signpost card that this is a supported archetype. I've also seen Bounding Krasis thrown around, which is another card that works with twin as well as being a flash card for this archetype, just like Great Oak Guardian.
I am very interested to hear what people have to say about this archetype and what things I may be missing!
Do the people running him generally like him more, as much, or less than other one drop ramp spells? He looks to me like the next best 1 drop "elf" to add after all the traditional 1 mana mana dorks, but it does not seem worth cutting any of them for him to me when he only works every other turn or so. Which means for my 540 cube, he is currently on tbe outside looking in, although I'm still interested to hear what people think.
Should I be giving this card another look?
While I am sure there have been less visible times where it has languished in the hand because it is not great when behind on board presence, it has been a powerful way for non-blue white decks to break through the duldrums of a stalled board or seal a game while they are ahead.I also like that it helps diversify the threats in white a bit by being an enchantment instead of a planeswalker, which at this point is almost harder to remove anyway.
We will keep an eye on just how often it performs vs languishes but at least so far for us we have found it to be a pretty good cube card. We've found that what it provides to white (outlined above) has outweighed its weakness when behind enough to be included in our cube.
For what its worth this is the only of these monarch enchantments we found good enough to run for us.
I actually completely forgot about that myself, having not played with the card in a year and a half or so... I was definitely picturing it as instant or sorcery in my mind. That is a tad unfortunate even if you will mostly be wanting to cast instants with it.
Thanks for the detailed breakdown/explanation!
In general, do people like Gearhulk better than Aetherling these days? I must say after reading these comments on Aetherling I am tempted to switch back. I like the fact that Gearhulk is an artifact which helps the artifact decks and also that it's value comes in the form of an etb - we've had a lot of good blink enablers lately like the new Thassa and it could be fun to add some support on the top end there.