I've done a couple more practice drafts for a giggle. The number of sleeved basics is an issue: I just picked a Vedalken Shackles safe in the knowledge that all my basic lands could be islands.
You're right: you don't need to go hard into aggro. The draft strategy seems to be as follows:
1) P1P1 Worldknit
2) Pick the most broken card in your next pack
3) Draft the archetype best suited to 2)
4) Keep an eye on your curve, but gleefully ignore mana costs
5) Chortle malevolently as you pick up late multicolour bombs
6) Profit
Now this is only based on testing against cubetutor bots, but I seriously think I would pick this over Sol Ring P1P1. Packs two and three, not so much.
The fact that there is so much redundancy in a cube, and mana curves tend to be so low makes this a very easy card to abuse. In my tests there have only ever been one or two cards in each deck I would not be happy to draw, and the fact that deck size is likely to be around 75 cards means that the chance of actually drawing one is a breeze.
Another advantage: after slamming 30 or so basic lands into your deck you will be able to sit back smugly and complain about how long it is taking your fellow drafters to deck build.
Is a master carton a booster box (36 boosters)? Or do you mean a case (6 booster boxes, 216 boosters)?
If the latter, you're talking 6480 cards! If the former, it's still 1080, more than enough for most cubes.
I'd suggest getting two booster boxes, which at 72 boosters will allow you to play 3 eight person drafts. Use this to decide what you do and don't like about the set, and put together the selection of cards you most enjoy, balanced as far as possible in terms of colour and curve. Sleeve these up and have a few drafts with this to see how you like it, and adjust accordingly.
In a draft set I would cheerfully break the singleton rule, but I wouldn't feel constrained by what Wizards has done: if there are rares or uncommons I want to see more frequently in my drafts I would simply adjust the numbers accordingly. I wouldn't bother making boosters with fixed rarity distributions either: just grab packs of fifteen cards safe in the knowledge that overall you will see more of the cards you have high numbers of multiple of. This is mostly because I am lazy.
If you are missing rares/mythics you really want to play it makes more sense to buy/trade for them as singles than buying lots of boosters.
What would you estimate the proportion of 3+ colour decks to be in your cube? I know that the majority of decks drafted in my cube are straight two colour without splash, where this card would be of questionable value (an on colour dual land a little more than half the time). That said, I take speculative colour fixing lands midpack all the time, just in case I want to splash or shift my draft.
If you are next to the person taking this card, I assume it is better to name a colour you are not drafting, to encourage the resident of Paliano to avoid competing with you for picks. Hate drafting is bad, etc.
I don't think that the "logistics" will be an insurmountable problem. Conspiracy drafts themselves might get bogged down where multiple cards are drafted that interrupt things. I managed to overcome DFCs as I am blessed with opposable thumbs.
I tried a few practice drafts using CubeTutor, to test out Worldknit
To start, I would take the card I would normally have picked first, then mentally substitute Worldknit, i.e. taking it P1P1. The decks looked pretty brutal: one was a 5 colour aggro/tempo deck. With a host of 1 and 2 drops, and topping off with a handful of stellar 4 drops (Cryptic Command, Hero of Oxid Ridge, Hero of Bladehold). The only card I was unhappy to include was a Worldly Tutor - not dreadful but I wouldn't normally want the card disadvantage/tempo loss in aggro. Picking things like Slayers' Stronghold, Maze of Ith and Mishra's Factory just felt unfair. Being guaranteed to curve from Savannah Lions into Ash Zealot into Geralf's Messenger seemed ridiculous. I'd be astonished if the deck didn't X-0.
Interestingly, in each of the decks I'd have wanted 33 of a single basic land type, to switch on Kird Ape, Rofellos and Fireblast respectively. This might be awkward when it comes to sleeving up basics.
I also built a 5-colour token deck and a 5-colour goodstuff deck. Again, there both looked strong and had only a couple of dud cards. The main thing seems to be that you have to pay attention to your curve.
I also tried a couple of drafts substituting it as my first pick in pack two and three. It gets significantly worse, as you are more likely to have a larger number of cards that are off theme or off curve, as well as strictly worse e.g. Shocklands which are worse than a basic land in these decks.
If this is picked pack one, I think that autopiloting into aggro would be the best strategy. This would seriously distort the draft,as one player would be sucking up aggro cards irrespective of colour, making things very hard for other aggro drafters.
I'm torn on this card. The variance seems super high, and it is possibly a P1P1 over almost any cube card. Who cares if you have to run every card you draft, if every card is a cube card. it is supremely liberating to be able to ignore colour restrictions, and sculpt a perfect curve and archetype. Pack two it is probably still good enough, but if it turns up in pack three I could see it not being run.
Interesting design. It's not uncommon for a drafter to first pick a bomb, but to end up in a different archetype/colours. I can see situations where I'm auctioning something pretty spicy, and might expect a decent card in return.
The creature form is playable, particularly as a colourless graveyard enabler.
It probably warrants testing, though it wouldn't be much good if you aren't regularly running large drafts.
I'm still running Goblin Bombardment, but I agree that Purphoros is part of the token package. I've been very happy with pushing tokens in my cube. Though mostly W/R/G, it spans all five colours to some extent, making it an archetype that has a lot of variety and resists "autopilot" drafting.
I've not seen that art before. I do like Therese Nielsen's art, and she's particularly good at painting women.
This just seems way too slow and restrictive. This would neither find a place in my WU tempo decks, nor in the controlling decks, where she would get in the way of Wraths.
If I could have my whole cube with art by a single artist it would be early Quinton Hoover. Idiosyncratic art styles are what Magic really lacks these days. And Banding.
And Phantasmal Image is significantly better than Clone. Copying an ETB trigger alone is often worth the 2 mana, and a lot of the stuff that would target it would kill it anyways.
This is so true in Cube. Most targeted spells I run would be fatal irrespective of the illusion weakness, barring cheeky stuff like Rancor.
I run Blast from the Past as my sole silver-bordered card at present. Although it has a lot of rules on it, as long as players are familiar with them (all the keywords are on other cube cards) it is fairly straightforward. It functions completely within the normal Magic rules set too.
I used to run Topsy Turvy. It was a powerful card, particularly if you could work out how to abuse it, but it created unpleasant headaches for too many players trying to keep track of the phase, and so was cut.
Token strategies are supported in my cube, so I'll be on the lookout for a copy of Symbol Status.
I used to run Rare-B-Gone, but it was annoying trying to remember which cards from before the coloured expansion symbols were used were rare.
Booster Tutor was another card I used to run, but cut because of laziness. Once the novelty had worn off it felt like a chore digging out a cube booster each time it was cast.
With sac effects and pox/stax type decks on the increase, the creature recursion on SoLaS has been more useful of late.
Pro red is less relevant as a removal colour, as the +2/+2 is good protection against burn already. I value pro-green higher to get past green fat/regenerators/tokens/otherwise irrelevant mana dudes/etc.
If I had to cut a sword it would be SoWaP because the effects are boring and it is worded awkwardly.
You're right: you don't need to go hard into aggro. The draft strategy seems to be as follows:
1) P1P1 Worldknit
2) Pick the most broken card in your next pack
3) Draft the archetype best suited to 2)
4) Keep an eye on your curve, but gleefully ignore mana costs
5) Chortle malevolently as you pick up late multicolour bombs
6) Profit
Now this is only based on testing against cubetutor bots, but I seriously think I would pick this over Sol Ring P1P1. Packs two and three, not so much.
The fact that there is so much redundancy in a cube, and mana curves tend to be so low makes this a very easy card to abuse. In my tests there have only ever been one or two cards in each deck I would not be happy to draw, and the fact that deck size is likely to be around 75 cards means that the chance of actually drawing one is a breeze.
Another advantage: after slamming 30 or so basic lands into your deck you will be able to sit back smugly and complain about how long it is taking your fellow drafters to deck build.
If the latter, you're talking 6480 cards! If the former, it's still 1080, more than enough for most cubes.
I'd suggest getting two booster boxes, which at 72 boosters will allow you to play 3 eight person drafts. Use this to decide what you do and don't like about the set, and put together the selection of cards you most enjoy, balanced as far as possible in terms of colour and curve. Sleeve these up and have a few drafts with this to see how you like it, and adjust accordingly.
In a draft set I would cheerfully break the singleton rule, but I wouldn't feel constrained by what Wizards has done: if there are rares or uncommons I want to see more frequently in my drafts I would simply adjust the numbers accordingly. I wouldn't bother making boosters with fixed rarity distributions either: just grab packs of fifteen cards safe in the knowledge that overall you will see more of the cards you have high numbers of multiple of. This is mostly because I am lazy.
If you are missing rares/mythics you really want to play it makes more sense to buy/trade for them as singles than buying lots of boosters.
If you are next to the person taking this card, I assume it is better to name a colour you are not drafting, to encourage the resident of Paliano to avoid competing with you for picks. Hate drafting is bad, etc.
I don't think that the "logistics" will be an insurmountable problem. Conspiracy drafts themselves might get bogged down where multiple cards are drafted that interrupt things. I managed to overcome DFCs as I am blessed with opposable thumbs.
To start, I would take the card I would normally have picked first, then mentally substitute Worldknit, i.e. taking it P1P1. The decks looked pretty brutal: one was a 5 colour aggro/tempo deck. With a host of 1 and 2 drops, and topping off with a handful of stellar 4 drops (Cryptic Command, Hero of Oxid Ridge, Hero of Bladehold). The only card I was unhappy to include was a Worldly Tutor - not dreadful but I wouldn't normally want the card disadvantage/tempo loss in aggro. Picking things like Slayers' Stronghold, Maze of Ith and Mishra's Factory just felt unfair. Being guaranteed to curve from Savannah Lions into Ash Zealot into Geralf's Messenger seemed ridiculous. I'd be astonished if the deck didn't X-0.
Interestingly, in each of the decks I'd have wanted 33 of a single basic land type, to switch on Kird Ape, Rofellos and Fireblast respectively. This might be awkward when it comes to sleeving up basics.
I also built a 5-colour token deck and a 5-colour goodstuff deck. Again, there both looked strong and had only a couple of dud cards. The main thing seems to be that you have to pay attention to your curve.
I also tried a couple of drafts substituting it as my first pick in pack two and three. It gets significantly worse, as you are more likely to have a larger number of cards that are off theme or off curve, as well as strictly worse e.g. Shocklands which are worse than a basic land in these decks.
If this is picked pack one, I think that autopiloting into aggro would be the best strategy. This would seriously distort the draft,as one player would be sucking up aggro cards irrespective of colour, making things very hard for other aggro drafters.
I'm torn on this card. The variance seems super high, and it is possibly a P1P1 over almost any cube card. Who cares if you have to run every card you draft, if every card is a cube card. it is supremely liberating to be able to ignore colour restrictions, and sculpt a perfect curve and archetype. Pack two it is probably still good enough, but if it turns up in pack three I could see it not being run.
The creature form is playable, particularly as a colourless graveyard enabler.
It probably warrants testing, though it wouldn't be much good if you aren't regularly running large drafts.
This just seems way too slow and restrictive. This would neither find a place in my WU tempo decks, nor in the controlling decks, where she would get in the way of Wraths.
If I could have my whole cube with art by a single artist it would be early Quinton Hoover. Idiosyncratic art styles are what Magic really lacks these days. And Banding.
Should we be running Donate to pull of combos like this with Abyssal Persecutor?
This is so true in Cube. Most targeted spells I run would be fatal irrespective of the illusion weakness, barring cheeky stuff like Rancor.
Carrion Feeder didn't work out for me in Pox builds. Could you give examples of how it is used?
I run Blast from the Past as my sole silver-bordered card at present. Although it has a lot of rules on it, as long as players are familiar with them (all the keywords are on other cube cards) it is fairly straightforward. It functions completely within the normal Magic rules set too.
I used to run Topsy Turvy. It was a powerful card, particularly if you could work out how to abuse it, but it created unpleasant headaches for too many players trying to keep track of the phase, and so was cut.
Token strategies are supported in my cube, so I'll be on the lookout for a copy of Symbol Status.
I used to run Rare-B-Gone, but it was annoying trying to remember which cards from before the coloured expansion symbols were used were rare.
Booster Tutor was another card I used to run, but cut because of laziness. Once the novelty had worn off it felt like a chore digging out a cube booster each time it was cast.
Pro red is less relevant as a removal colour, as the +2/+2 is good protection against burn already. I value pro-green higher to get past green fat/regenerators/tokens/otherwise irrelevant mana dudes/etc.
If I had to cut a sword it would be SoWaP because the effects are boring and it is worded awkwardly.