I'm super excited to see some action on this thread again!
Sharuum used to be my absolute favorite commander when I used to play a lot. I ended up selling out most of my high powered EDH decks to buy into legacy at the time, but now am finding my love for commander again. As a result I've been toying around with the idea of rebuilding this engine Sharuum. I miss all the crazy complex lines that the deck had.
What happened with Krark-Clan Ironworks? It hasn't been mentioned in the last few pages, and I feel like it used to be an integral part of engine va-ruum being able to have explosive mana heavy turns?
I think blue aggro is barely supported in my cube, I ended up cutting a lot of blue tempo cards when shrinking the cube a bit. That included Delver, Daze, Snap, Ninja, etc. I may revisit the archetype, as I love the cards in constructed formats typically, but they felt weak as one-offs etc.
Now that you mention it, Ingester may be too weak these days. I've been meaning to throw in the blue saga from DOM, but unsure if it can just be a replacement for ingester?
Bane I think seems like an easy direct swap for Crusher, thanks!
You bring up a good point w/ cackler (and I guess hybrid cards in general). Since they're hybrid mana, they could fit in a lot more decks than a gold card would. I'll have to look into this a bit more and perhaps swap out the cackler!
I'm coming back to cube! A while ago, I made my first attempt at building a cube, by building a 540 peasant cube. I didn't really like how inconsistent it seemed to feel with so many cards, and what felt like a wildly varying power level.
Tooling around in MTG Arena inspired me to share M:TG with more people at the office. I've since trimmed the cube down to 375.
I'd love some help really tuning this cube, and maybe strengthening more archetypes that are present, or better planning archetypes out in general (I didn't do much of it). I'll be poking around for cards from DOM, M19, and GRN as I haven't updated for those sets as well.
Thanks so much for your help in the past and (hopefully) with this new endeavor!
If there's a good "standard" peasant cube to copy that's <400 cards I'd be happy to take a peek as well
Black: Grasping Scoundrel (I'd lean towards the other 1-drops being enough @ 360), Bone Shredder (you have enough removal), probably Phyrexian Rager (fine, but unexciting).
You could also think about cutting a 2-drop. I'm not a fan of Wight of Precinct Six, but I know others have good success with it. Nezumi Graverobber is cool but very slow.
Just pointing out that you also have some very easy cuts for a 360 cube in the colorless section.
You don't need both Trusty Machete and Vulshok Morningstar in a cube of that size, especially not in a cube that runs all the op equipment. You probably don't even need one of them.
You can cut one of the high cmc mana rocks (Pristine Talisman, Worn Powerstone or Hedron Archive).
You can cut one of the three vehicles. I run a relatively large amount of equipment and two vehicles at 420 and I often have problems finding room for them in decks. Obvious cut would be the mediocre Ovalchase Dragster.
Last but not least you definitely don't need four big Eldrazi. You can easily cut two of them. I'd keep Artisan of Kozilek and one of the others.
Should be pretty easy to get 5 more cards for the colored section that way.
Personally I'd go with a 30 card guild section and cut the life gain lands, but that's a matter of taste of course. A large amount of mediocre/bad duals and multicolor cards will make drafting the last half of packs pretty linear.
EDIT: Agree with everything Squirrely said except for Nezumi Graverobber. He's been great for me and it's also a card with a very unique effect.
Thanks for the help both of you! The colorless cuts were pretty easy to make so I made those.
Life gain lands are cut for now, which leaves me at 53 cards per color
(3 cards a color after the suggested color cuts) The home stretch!
I think I'm going to do the 50x each color, 40 guild cards with vivids/tri lands.. Still a little undecided w/ the lifegain lands so maybe I'll just test out cutting them and see what happens.
Figuring out the last 5~10 cuts in each color is driving me insane though. Would love any pointers in finding the weakest parts left in each color if anyone has the spare time!
Also @leadfeather, I've been using your cube as a reference too, hah!
Has Library of Alexandria/Mana Drain ever felt too powerful to answer in drafts?
I just have periods of procrastination and can complete a draft a draft on CubeTutor in five minutes.
390 is my choice because I do want there to be some variation in an 8-person draft pod or 4-person sealed pod. People cannot expect with absolute certainty that all the cards will be in the total pool. However, as Leelue stated at some point in the past: there is also no reason to only use multiples of 90. 30 extra hits the sweet spot for me, given the amount of archetype-grounding cards (Worm Harvest, Rise from the Tides, Intangible Virtue) that you still want to *probably* be in the pool even when it should not be a given.
On that topic, is there a thread or blog somewhere going over what archetypes your cube supports? Regarding the power level of the cube, does it feel balanced with a smaller cube? In our playing with the cube being so big, if somebody picked up a Library/Warhammer/SkullClamp things were immensely in their favor
With multiples of 15 (or whatever your pack size is) you're making sure the expansion works for sealed, draft variants like grid draft or just for having an extra player over. There isn't much of a reason not to have multiples of 15, unless you're very sure those scenarios never happen for you.
Agreed. Also, if I knew my cube was a random number of cards instead, I might lose sleep at night thinking about it.
How has the power level of your cube felt? Are the powerful staples (warhammer/skullclamp/top) polarizing if somebody picks it up? Or does the smaller cube help balance that out? Do you have a good idea what archetypes your cube supports? Would you ever consider Library of Alexandria/Mana Drain in your particular cube?
I am honoured that my list would be among the templates. If you are cutting down, the approach of starting with gold cards is definitely correct, especially since so many colours have trouble supporting a section larger than around three (especially Boros). Other places definitely inclyde the blue and green top-end creatures, blue instants, and Naya 2-3 drop creatures. I think you can probably get a good feel for which slots would be bloated if you started hacking away just by looking at the visual on the standard list on Cubetutor: if a portion appears unproportionate at a glance, it probably is. I would wager that the biggets problem comes with the qualitative changes a smaller list introduces since specific things need to be supported more. One of the biggest changes is probably the amount of top-end finishers: only the best really make the cut if you want to make sure you also have sufficient support for more aggressive strategies.
Thanks for the tips! I stumbled upon your list multiple times! Looks like it's one of the most drafted peasant cubes on cubetutor
The power level drop felt pretty big at 540, What were your reasons for going 390 instead of 360? (390 being a bit more random of a number)
That's kind of how I felt as well. There are some powerful cards, but a whole lot of "meh" cards. I actually really like your cube and was thinking of copying either yours or VariSami's cube when I cut down. I saw you were looking to slot in some cards on your thread but I think it hasn't been updated in a while!
The CubeTutor is up to date. Most of what I'm missing are more expensive older uncommons (like Sylvan Library and Demonic Tutor).
What would you cut for those if you had them? Are those the only two you're wishing you had still?
the best way to evaluate a cube is to start somewhere (throw together all cards that seem fun or strong), play it and then throw out underperforming cards and add stuff that support the drafted archetypes. after 2 or 3 drafts the cube should have a balanced and fun experience. it takes a lot of time to browse through all available cards though.
on 360 youll be able to flesh out certain archetypes really well, but drafting might become railroading (obvious picks). it also becomes boring much faster. i still think its the best size for somewhat competitve drafts, because the pool stays the same.
Yeah we've done a few sealed since some of the players are new-ish or haven't played in a long time. The larger cube makes it feel like there is a large gap in power level between the bottom and the top
My 360 peasant list runs 50 WUBRG, 30 Multi (3 per guild, no Shards/Wedges), 80 colorless (including lands). Personally I think 360 is the perfect spot for peasant cubes. I might go up to 405 eventually, but the power level really starts to drop off after that.
That's kind of how I felt as well. There are some powerful cards, but a whole lot of "meh" cards. I actually really like your cube and was thinking of copying either yours or VariSami's cube when I cut down. I saw you were looking to slot in some cards on your thread but I think it hasn't been updated in a while!
I've managed to test the cube a bit, and the powerful cards are a bit feelsbad in a 540 peasant cube. It felt like there weren't a high number of good cards in a cube that big, so the powerful cards stood out even more. I'm going to take a few of them out, but this has me thinking I wanna take my cube down to 360
Is there a good "rule of thumb" to cut down? Like X of each color X of each guild+ X colorless/artifacts/lands
When I start drafting this cube more, how do I adjust the cube based on card performance? Is it just based on asking the players how they felt? Do you guys keep track of stats in any way?
I like your idea of a "different" experience. How can that be done in a Peasant cube? Supporting of more archetypes?
All you have to do is run a cube that has the peasant restrictions and it'll be different than the powered/unpowered cubes your playgroup already has access to. The 'different' was just in regards to a peasant cube playing out a good amount differently than a reg cube overall, which you said you had multiple people already running those.
What you will see if you look at most cubes here is an experience kind of like the Masters sets - very powerful custom draft sets.
That's the experience I'd be going for in your situation, for the reasons that Salmo already talked about. Even with "normal" uncommons you'll get to do super stupid stuff (Temur Sabertooth plus Cloudgoat Ranger, Phantom Centaur plus pants), you don't need to run the "peasant power" cards for that. A lot of those cards simply prevent games of Magic, something that you don't want if you want your cube to be attractive to players who are kind of new to Magic or who just play for fun. Those people are very quick to say "well that's stupid, I'm done with this".
What you need to do to get there is cut the broken cards that prevent games from happening and add archetypes. As I said in the other thread, I'd recommend the tri-color theme method for that.
Thanks for the tips!
I found your post:
Pick a theme for each three-color pair (say reanimator control for Grixis, spells matter for Jeskai, Naya +1/+1 tokens,...) and you'll get overlapping archetypes in your guilds automatically while not shoehorning your guilds into being narrow one-trick ponies.
Should I just reference the archetype list and kind of go from there? Or take my 540 and cut down (is 540 ok or should I cut down? I've heard that bigger cubes are much harder to manage).
I've also stumbled upon Vari Sami's cube which seems to be one of the top drafted cubes out there (CT doesn't seem to just let me search for peasant cubes outside of just searching for the word). However his cube looks like it runs Library/Mana Drain and the other artifacts that seem pretty nuts.
[quote from="Salmo »" url="/forums/the-game/the-cube-forum/pauper-peasant-discussion/789544-cube-noob-building-a-cube?comment=2"]
I wanted a cube that would maybe be a bit more friendly with playgroups with less mtg experience (work group/gf and her friends) while being powerful enough to be fun for my normal legacy playgroup (does power always mean fun?).
The people playing legacy already like magic if they're buying into those decks/cubes--you don't have to worry about them having fun with a peasant cube, they probably like drafting too if there are multiple cubes in your group and peasant is def more fun than RIX, the only thing that counts against it is that there's no value so the spikes might like cube less.
The people in the former group have less experience and are less committed to magic overall, and that's a much better reason to not run the stupid powerful cards than the other reasons for running them are. It's really not fun for people learning how to play magic or with less experience to get smoked, and it's even less fun when the cards smoking them make the player on the other side feel helpless.
The best thing is to give your playgroup a *different* experience (especially so when they have a bunch of reg cubes to choose from as is) and the broken cards don't really provide that. Like, what is Sol Ring accomplishing for your cube environment other than wins? What decks does it support? Is there any thought to drafting it (never pass it) or playing it (pay 1; win) and is that the type of card you really want next to [[insert card that only shows up in peasant lists here]]?
The cube is going to feel powerful. You're making a format full of essentially retail draft all-stars, and those cards certainly feel powerful when in similar company and don't need Sol Ring for them to be good.
</blockquote>
Awesome advice, thank you!
I do have Sol Ring dropped currently, with no plans to include it. Current cube has: Land Tax/Mana Drain/Behemoth/Luxodon/Skullclamp in the cube, in terms of powerful cards (unsure if there are more that I just missed).
Land Tax has some cool interactions with other cards like Forbid and can help some aggro decks cut on lands.
Mana Drain I just put in because I liked the card, hah.
Skullclamp is insane in any deck that has a ton of creatures and feels pretty great in token strategies.
Behemoth/Luxodon are interesting. They feel like they are just snap picks if you see them. But maybe since they have no real synergy, they aren't great to have?
I like your idea of a "different" experience. How can that be done in a Peasant cube? Supporting of more archetypes?
Sharuum used to be my absolute favorite commander when I used to play a lot. I ended up selling out most of my high powered EDH decks to buy into legacy at the time, but now am finding my love for commander again. As a result I've been toying around with the idea of rebuilding this engine Sharuum. I miss all the crazy complex lines that the deck had.
What happened with Krark-Clan Ironworks? It hasn't been mentioned in the last few pages, and I feel like it used to be an integral part of engine va-ruum being able to have explosive mana heavy turns?
I think blue aggro is barely supported in my cube, I ended up cutting a lot of blue tempo cards when shrinking the cube a bit. That included Delver, Daze, Snap, Ninja, etc. I may revisit the archetype, as I love the cards in constructed formats typically, but they felt weak as one-offs etc.
Now that you mention it, Ingester may be too weak these days. I've been meaning to throw in the blue saga from DOM, but unsure if it can just be a replacement for ingester?
Bane I think seems like an easy direct swap for Crusher, thanks!
You bring up a good point w/ cackler (and I guess hybrid cards in general). Since they're hybrid mana, they could fit in a lot more decks than a gold card would. I'll have to look into this a bit more and perhaps swap out the cackler!
I'm coming back to cube! A while ago, I made my first attempt at building a cube, by building a 540 peasant cube. I didn't really like how inconsistent it seemed to feel with so many cards, and what felt like a wildly varying power level.
Tooling around in MTG Arena inspired me to share M:TG with more people at the office. I've since trimmed the cube down to 375.
I'd love some help really tuning this cube, and maybe strengthening more archetypes that are present, or better planning archetypes out in general (I didn't do much of it). I'll be poking around for cards from DOM, M19, and GRN as I haven't updated for those sets as well.
Thanks so much for your help in the past and (hopefully) with this new endeavor!
If there's a good "standard" peasant cube to copy that's <400 cards I'd be happy to take a peek as well
Cube here
Thanks for the help both of you! The colorless cuts were pretty easy to make so I made those.
Life gain lands are cut for now, which leaves me at 53 cards per color
(3 cards a color after the suggested color cuts) The home stretch!
Figuring out the last 5~10 cuts in each color is driving me insane though. Would love any pointers in finding the weakest parts left in each color if anyone has the spare time!
Also @leadfeather, I've been using your cube as a reference too, hah!
Has Library of Alexandria/Mana Drain ever felt too powerful to answer in drafts?
Would cutting the 10 duals but NOT the 10 guild cards make the cube too awkward? Too many guild cards and not a ton of fixing?
I feel like most 360 cubes run a low number of guild cards.
Finally making some progress cutting down: http://www.cubetutor.com/viewcube/98055
I'm a bit torn on doing
50 each color, 40 Multi, 70 colorless - Leave in more mana fixing (lifegain duals from khanhs), trim down individual colors more
60 ea Color, 30 Multi, 60 colorless- Cut the lifegain duals from Khans and the multi cards as a result.
2nd option feels easier as I'm having trouble cutting each color down.
On that topic, is there a thread or blog somewhere going over what archetypes your cube supports?
How has the power level of your cube felt? Are the powerful staples (warhammer/skullclamp/top) polarizing if somebody picks it up? Or does the smaller cube help balance that out? Do you have a good idea what archetypes your cube supports? Would you ever consider Library of Alexandria/Mana Drain in your particular cube?
Awesome thanks for the input!
Thanks for the tips! I stumbled upon your list multiple times! Looks like it's one of the most drafted peasant cubes on cubetutor
The power level drop felt pretty big at 540, What were your reasons for going 390 instead of 360? (390 being a bit more random of a number)
What would you cut for those if you had them? Are those the only two you're wishing you had still?
Yeah we've done a few sealed since some of the players are new-ish or haven't played in a long time. The larger cube makes it feel like there is a large gap in power level between the bottom and the top
That's kind of how I felt as well. There are some powerful cards, but a whole lot of "meh" cards. I actually really like your cube and was thinking of copying either yours or VariSami's cube when I cut down. I saw you were looking to slot in some cards on your thread but I think it hasn't been updated in a while!
I've managed to test the cube a bit, and the powerful cards are a bit feelsbad in a 540 peasant cube. It felt like there weren't a high number of good cards in a cube that big, so the powerful cards stood out even more. I'm going to take a few of them out, but this has me thinking I wanna take my cube down to 360
Is there a good "rule of thumb" to cut down? Like X of each color X of each guild+ X colorless/artifacts/lands
Ah ok, thanks for that clarification!
Thanks for the tips!
I found your post:
Should I just reference the archetype list and kind of go from there? Or take my 540 and cut down (is 540 ok or should I cut down? I've heard that bigger cubes are much harder to manage).
I've also stumbled upon Vari Sami's cube which seems to be one of the top drafted cubes out there (CT doesn't seem to just let me search for peasant cubes outside of just searching for the word). However his cube looks like it runs Library/Mana Drain and the other artifacts that seem pretty nuts.
Awesome advice, thank you!
I do have Sol Ring dropped currently, with no plans to include it. Current cube has: Land Tax/Mana Drain/Behemoth/Luxodon/Skullclamp in the cube, in terms of powerful cards (unsure if there are more that I just missed).
Land Tax has some cool interactions with other cards like Forbid and can help some aggro decks cut on lands.
Mana Drain I just put in because I liked the card, hah.
Skullclamp is insane in any deck that has a ton of creatures and feels pretty great in token strategies.
Behemoth/Luxodon are interesting. They feel like they are just snap picks if you see them. But maybe since they have no real synergy, they aren't great to have?
I like your idea of a "different" experience. How can that be done in a Peasant cube? Supporting of more archetypes?