I think it's funny that there's always chatter of not wanting to cube a bunch of Incinerate variants, but nobody ever brings up the same topic for something like Llanowar Elves.
This is the first that I've heard of discussion on what it'd take for Incinerate variants to leave a cube, and 1-mana elves are arguably better/less easily replaced than red burn.
I've ran all of those cards in my pauper and powered cube and they've been generally solid, and I've seen them taken out of the MTGO cubes, replaced by things that do similar things - like Searing Blaze, Smash to Smithereens - likely because they have the same converted mana cost. (and IMO, there were likely better cuts for them.)
It goes without saying that these cards do their role well and that's why they've been around for so long, but think back to cards like Hero of Oxid Ridge, lands like bouncelands and other cards that we all assumed would be cube staples for the ages, only to find themselves make their way out of many lists.
So what do you think will be the impetus that has the 1R 3-damage dealers to leave our cubes?
Rather than copy and paste what I said in my article when it came out, my thoughts now are:
It's weird because it... looks like it'd be a Sacred Cat with upside, one which may never come due to a possibly lofty upside. But I found that it generally isn't too difficult to flip and the base rate isn't too awful. I've even found times that even in low-to-the-ground aggro decks, its ability to make a mana would help with plays like casting and equipping equipment, which isn't something you usually tend to think of for a low-to-the-ground deck (especially if you're running a low land count, but I'm always too scared to go under 15 lands.)
I wouldn't call it a staple or anything and I guess it says something that I finally am not playing vanilla 2/1s for W anymore (they're in my cube sideboard) but I don't really feel like taking out Legion's Landing anytime soon. I do think that cutting a 2/1 with upside for LL is... I don't think it's right.
I think it became ormendal... I can prolly count the number of times on my hand... while texting someone at the same time. usually was a pricey dude ranch. :/
Generslly I've been making more of a "give it a try, see how it shakes out" mentality, although that may be a luxury afforded to me by regularly cubing. But I usually figure that rather than thinking "you know, this seems good. Maybe." that getting some reps in really helps to take the abstraction out of things.
My issue with heliods spear was that it was pretty bleh when topdecked or with an anemic board state, because it felt like a "kick me while I'm down" type of thing. Although I guess that happens with equipment or vehicles, eh?
It's definitely easier to cast than the knight. Maybe it's tye body? It seems like it's been performing better than the anthems did, though it's been a while since running those.
I haven't seen the knights but should prolly look. I got some Final Fantasy tcg knights from FFT but the official ones look amazing. They've really been knocking it out of the park with tokens lately.
I've had your appearance on CC queued up since it released, but haven't gotten to it yet. It's definitely one I look forward to listening to.
How much Dominaria testing have you gotten in so far? Specifically, I'd be curious about the following.
Benalish Marshal - Is WWW not too intensive?
History of Benalia - This was great against me at the prere (I was obviously not lucky enough to crack one, lol), but Knights are definitely more abundant in that format.
Zahid, Djinn of the Lamp - This guy was nuts at the prere and seems like he could translate well as finisher in blue that usually costs 3U. I'd worry that a generic 5/6 flyer, even at four mana, is just not powerful enough for this format.
Josu Vess, Lich Knight - He's obviously incredible if you get to cast him for full value, but how often is that? Is the non-kicked option good enough?
Saproling Migration - Is this supporting something specific? It was fine for me at the prere, but nothing to write home about without being able to follow it up with some sort of mass pump effect.
I talked about some of the points in the article but tl;dr:
Oddly benalish marshal usually was great even if he came out on something like turn 5-6, since it puts a lot of power out. Usually wasn't too hard to get out, even in non mono decks.
Josu Vess' kicker is prolly a pipe dream and never got kicked, but I got 8 headless horseman in case I do! Thing just hits like a truck, same with Zahid, where the general consensus was that even though not super flashy, a big fat moti hits like a tank.
Knight saga was overall great. Lots of power but doesnt need knights. Sap migration is mostly early game stuff, and I'm guessing its shelf life won't be super long.
I've been trying the stuff out since (at least for the stuff that got spoiled) it was known, and definitely wanted to get a lot of reps in with weird stuff like Karn, etc.
ZF very underrated currently as the effect isn't backbreaking, but it isn't on the level of those lands. It's very good, though.
It was recently in a 3-0 deck and the drafter said it was good, and I'm likely going to have it in my cube for some time. No idea how long, but it's quite good.
Other than colorless matters decks, this looks like the right kind of deck for it. The scry can really smooth out draws for hard aggro decks like this. I think if I wanted another land to help support colorless matters, Zhalfrin Void would be my choice to go in.
I want to say there was someone who drafted a durdling esper control deck and he liked it there too. Unfortunately don't have a deck pic, but I remember him having either 2-3 signets to help offset making Wingding mana. I have no idea how his land fixing was either. It's weird just how much the labd etb untapped helps it get value (even if I don't play the theros temples, but that's more a space constraint issue. :/ )
I'm kind of surprised I'm not seeing more talk about this card. This seems to me to be on the level of stuff like Ash Barrens or maybe even City of Brass. Am I crazy?
ZF very underrated currently as the effect isn't backbreaking, but it isn't on the level of those lands. It's very good, though.
It was recently in a 3-0 deck and the drafter said it was good, and I'm likely going to have it in my cube for some time. No idea how long, but it's quite good.
With regards to your point, yes. Looking at the thread, you'll see that it was seen as an out-of-the-norm things and, yes, that is something that I created that has become mainstream.
Wow, man. I just read through the first five or so pages of your cube thread linked here and it made me so nostalgic for those early days in the cube forum. Discussion was sometimes heated but always interesting. Multiple people chiming in to provide comments, suggestions, and advice on cube updates or interesting ideas. Super cool to read through that.
Man, I miss the wild-west days of cube when we had no idea what we were doing. I played Molten Hydra in my first cube. That card is terrible even by 2007 standards.
A few weeks ago, I was on the Color Commontary podcast (it's a pauper podcast) to talk about pauper cube, which inevitably became me talking about my cube history; I talked about how from 2007-2013 (?) or so, this forum was where a lot of cube theory started and how it started out roughly, as the "you make the cube" was a bloated mess with things like the green Decree, and a lot of junk.
I'm hoping we can get some more dynamic discussion going, since it can get stilted or become like "ships passing in the night." Maybe the first step to recovery is acknowledgement.
btw, pringles, I still have the strip mine that you altered, but it's been in retirement since it got water spilled on it. I ended up getting it replaced for my regular cube, but I'm putting it in my peasant cube which should be premiering IRL this week!
Curious, you wrote in the tone as if you had some experience with the lower tier cubeable cards in the set.
Do you do a huge testing batch with proxies before the set comes out and cull from there?
Pretty much, yeah. I updated my list on Cubetutor with Dominaria things and it's where I'm mostly "settled" and I'm happy with it. But I usually try a *lot* of things out, since I've found that over the years, mistakes were more made in the dismissing a card rather than being overly enthusiastic about it.
Baloths is fine, but it plays more like a 7+cc creature, and green has plenty of better options in that arena already.
Why a million Evolving Wilds and only one art option for Terramorphic Expanse?
Unfortunately, E. Wilds gets a bunch more printings due to it having a more generic plane-friendly name and usually they tend to change it up whenever they bring it to the new plane. A lot of the Terramorphic reprints were with the M-core sets, but I am surprised that it hasn't been printed in commander sets, etc, especially since the art is definitely set in Time Spiral (the mountains especially, are Time Spiral era.)
I remember really wanting to like Baloths as something that could take over a game, but it never really did. I tend to prefer things like Titania, Protector of Argoth as a big giant thing that works with fetches, etc. Obv she doesn't trigger on landfall, but found it anemic (as wtwlf pointed out, it's more a 7 drop and has been kinda eh at that.)
This is the first that I've heard of discussion on what it'd take for Incinerate variants to leave a cube, and 1-mana elves are arguably better/less easily replaced than red burn.
I've ran all of those cards in my pauper and powered cube and they've been generally solid, and I've seen them taken out of the MTGO cubes, replaced by things that do similar things - like Searing Blaze, Smash to Smithereens - likely because they have the same converted mana cost. (and IMO, there were likely better cuts for them.)
It goes without saying that these cards do their role well and that's why they've been around for so long, but think back to cards like Hero of Oxid Ridge, lands like bouncelands and other cards that we all assumed would be cube staples for the ages, only to find themselves make their way out of many lists.
So what do you think will be the impetus that has the 1R 3-damage dealers to leave our cubes?
It's weird because it... looks like it'd be a Sacred Cat with upside, one which may never come due to a possibly lofty upside. But I found that it generally isn't too difficult to flip and the base rate isn't too awful. I've even found times that even in low-to-the-ground aggro decks, its ability to make a mana would help with plays like casting and equipping equipment, which isn't something you usually tend to think of for a low-to-the-ground deck (especially if you're running a low land count, but I'm always too scared to go under 15 lands.)
I wouldn't call it a staple or anything and I guess it says something that I finally am not playing vanilla 2/1s for W anymore (they're in my cube sideboard) but I don't really feel like taking out Legion's Landing anytime soon. I do think that cutting a 2/1 with upside for LL is... I don't think it's right.
Weirdly I haven't seen the midcombat blowout happen, which is odd because yeah, it's not exactly hard to kill a 3/3, ya know?
Let me know how it shakes out, glad my posting has been helpful.
Generslly I've been making more of a "give it a try, see how it shakes out" mentality, although that may be a luxury afforded to me by regularly cubing. But I usually figure that rather than thinking "you know, this seems good. Maybe." that getting some reps in really helps to take the abstraction out of things.
It's definitely easier to cast than the knight. Maybe it's tye body? It seems like it's been performing better than the anthems did, though it's been a while since running those.
I haven't seen the knights but should prolly look.
Great stuff as always, Mark.
I talked about some of the points in the article but tl;dr:
Oddly benalish marshal usually was great even if he came out on something like turn 5-6, since it puts a lot of power out. Usually wasn't too hard to get out, even in non mono decks.
Josu Vess' kicker is prolly a pipe dream and never got kicked, but I got 8 headless horseman in case I do! Thing just hits like a truck, same with Zahid, where the general consensus was that even though not super flashy, a big fat moti hits like a tank.
Knight saga was overall great. Lots of power but doesnt need knights. Sap migration is mostly early game stuff, and I'm guessing its shelf life won't be super long.
I've been trying the stuff out since (at least for the stuff that got spoiled) it was known, and definitely wanted to get a lot of reps in with weird stuff like Karn, etc.
I want to say there was someone who drafted a durdling esper control deck and he liked it there too. Unfortunately don't have a deck pic, but I remember him having either 2-3 signets to help offset making Wingding mana. I have no idea how his land fixing was either. It's weird just how much the labd etb untapped helps it get value (even if I don't play the theros temples, but that's more a space constraint issue. :/ )
Uggggh why did I not record that deck D:
Here's one from my plain ol' powered cube. I finally updated it on cube tutor after, literally, over a year!
I feel like I'm going to take the Shrine here and just jam red? I dunno. Maybe Daze? D:
ZF very underrated currently as the effect isn't backbreaking, but it isn't on the level of those lands. It's very good, though.
It was recently in a 3-0 deck and the drafter said it was good, and I'm likely going to have it in my cube for some time. No idea how long, but it's quite good.
A few weeks ago, I was on the Color Commontary podcast (it's a pauper podcast) to talk about pauper cube, which inevitably became me talking about my cube history; I talked about how from 2007-2013 (?) or so, this forum was where a lot of cube theory started and how it started out roughly, as the "you make the cube" was a bloated mess with things like the green Decree, and a lot of junk.
I'm hoping we can get some more dynamic discussion going, since it can get stilted or become like "ships passing in the night." Maybe the first step to recovery is acknowledgement.
btw, pringles, I still have the strip mine that you altered, but it's been in retirement since it got water spilled on it. I ended up getting it replaced for my regular cube, but I'm putting it in my peasant cube which should be premiering IRL this week!
Pretty much, yeah. I updated my list on Cubetutor with Dominaria things and it's where I'm mostly "settled" and I'm happy with it. But I usually try a *lot* of things out, since I've found that over the years, mistakes were more made in the dismissing a card rather than being overly enthusiastic about it.
Unfortunately, E. Wilds gets a bunch more printings due to it having a more generic plane-friendly name and usually they tend to change it up whenever they bring it to the new plane. A lot of the Terramorphic reprints were with the M-core sets, but I am surprised that it hasn't been printed in commander sets, etc, especially since the art is definitely set in Time Spiral (the mountains especially, are Time Spiral era.)
I remember really wanting to like Baloths as something that could take over a game, but it never really did. I tend to prefer things like Titania, Protector of Argoth as a big giant thing that works with fetches, etc. Obv she doesn't trigger on landfall, but found it anemic (as wtwlf pointed out, it's more a 7 drop and has been kinda eh at that.)
RE: what I'd love to see with new art:
Fireslinger
Treasure Cruise
Marsh Flitter
Frogmite