Welcome to a special mechanics only article for The Awesome Cube. I've found the process of grading mechanics to be very rewarding, and with the advent of Modern Horizons 3, I'm suddenly finding myself inundated with mechanics from the past to discuss. After making a rather involved excel spreadsheet, I now have a list of all Magic's mechanics, the set they were originally printed, and their associated grades. After perusing the list I've found that there are quite a lot of mechanics that are unlikely to be reprinted, even in supplementary products like Modern Horizons. As such, I've decided to do two supplementary articles to fill in some of these gaps. The first will be an analysis of all of the mechanics contained within the un-sets of Unglued, Unhinged, Unstable, Unsanctioned, and Unfinity. The second will be focused on Commander, multiplayer, and various forms of play mechanics. Today, we'll be focusing on the un-sets and their silver bordered wackiness. Despite their tone and reputation, the un-sets have long been a breeding ground for experimentation and creativity, often leading to representation in future black bordered designs. As such, I'm going to be evaluating every named mechanic in these sets with an open mind, making every effort not to disregard anything on the basis of it being tonally dissonant or outside the bounds of what black border allows. As always, I'll be giving two grades for each mechanic. The first will be a grade for the design in general based on the play patterns it promotes, the design space it contains, and generally how enjoyable it is to play with. I will not be taking any constructed applications into account as it would be outside the scope of the article. The second will be a context grade based on how I expect the mechanic to perform and be supported within my own cube ONLY. The effectiveness of individual mechanics varies wildly among cubes, and a mechanic that is a D in my cube may be an A in yours. I'll lay out the grading criteria below. Note that this criteria is much more of a general suggestion for this article since there are so many mechanics that only appear on one or two cards. These mechanic grades have to apply to how much value there would be in exploring these mechanics further.
A - Contributes to interesting gameplay and deck building decisions, may have cross synergies, no baggage. Sparks joy. (Cube - actively looking to include)
B - Works as intended, may have cross synergies and/or existing support structure, but has at least one developmental/design frustration. (Cube - actively looking to include)
C - Mechanic is inoffensive. Does not spark joy or enhance an environment, but it does not create issues or confusion when considered (Cube - will include as appropriate)
D - Mechanic is functional, but has baggage, may not be supported properly, and/or has some frustrating lines of play. (Cube - cards must excel in spite of mechanic)
F - Mechanic does not work as intended, is not supported, and/or contributes to an actively frustrating experience. (Cube - excluded from consideration)
With that out of the way, let's jam!
Alliterative
Alliterative, as the name implies, rewards you for casting spells whose card names feature alliteration of two or more capitalized letters. As there was only one card printed with the mechanic, Treacherous Trapezist in Unfinity, the design space wasn't explored very deeply. Ultimately, that's probably for the best as it appears to be a fairly shallow mechanic when it comes to support and design space. This is fairly common for un-mechanics as they are often used to tell a singular joke as much as they form the basis of a set or attempt to revolutionize future designs. While you can build a deck around alliterative card names, it doesn't feel like something that will come together that often, and certainly doesn't beg for specific attention to be paid to supporting it. There's no flavor associated with it either, which hampers any further excitement that might arise from its existence. Any time cards that care about alliteration trigger, it's going to feel random, unearned, and, considering the source material, not particularly funny or clever. It's also a little annoying that the mechanic is so finnicky when it comes to capitalization, particularly in other languages. As such, it's probably for the best that only one card was printed with the mechanic.
Alliterative Grade: F
Alliterative Grade in Cube: F
I'm a huge fan of creatures that have first strike when attacking because it changes their value strategically. Their conditionality sends a message to players about the type of deck that wants to play them, allowing them to carry different value across different board states. Alpha strike is also conditional first strike, except a creature gains it if they are engaged in combat with a creature whose name comes after theirs alphabetically. This is incredibly difficult to plan around as you would need advance knowledge of your opponent's deck and have your draws line up against theirs properly. In practice, you simply have to read the name every creature your opponent has every combat and determine which ones trigger alpha strike, and then hope your opponent is incapable of doing the same mental gymnastics. It's not difficult, but it's incredibly tedious for very little gain. There is no flavor or humor attached to it, just a poor mechanical implementation of the "strike" name.
Alpha Strike Grade: F
Alpha Strike Grade in Cube: F
Art menace is another mechanic that only appears on a single card; Garbage Elemental variant #5 from Unstable. A creature with art menace cannot be blocked unless there are two or more visible "figures" in the defending creature's art. The "joke" here, of course, is that the two creatures in the art team up to block the creature with art menace. This is an example of a joke that I both conceptually understand and find frustrating because it's going to cause gameplay concerns. Players who read the word "menace" on their creature are going to instinctively assume that it can be blocked with two creatures, even if they both have a single "figure" in their artwork. This isn't the case as it can only be blocked by a single creature with two "figures" in its artwork. This confusion is exacerbated by the unclear definition of the word "figure" which is sure to lead to disagreements and judge calls. Furthermore, even if you do have a qualified creature to block with, it doesn't mean that block is profitable, since it's still contingent on relative creature sizes. Art menace is an ability that neither player has any real control over and, like the previous mechanics, it's going to feel completely random when it's functional and when it's not. Nevertheless, I prefer conditional unblockability to conditional first strike, as it's a much more significant effect. Your creature being unblockable will impact the board in a way that first strike simply does not, which means it's more difficult to ignore. Alpha strike can easily lead to situations where one player makes a block without understanding whether or not a creature has first strike. This is generally more difficult to accomplish with art menace, which makes it a marginally better mechanic.
Art Menace Grade: D-
Art Menace Grade in Cube: D-
Assembling contraptions is the keystone mechanic of Unstable and represents the rare black bordered mechanic that was fully realized in silver border. Steamflogger Boss introduced riggers, contraptions, and assembling contraptions as part of an internal joke in Future Sight, with no real plans to develop the mechanic. One offhand comment from Aaron Forsythe later, and assembling contraptions was only a matter of time. The actual execution of the mechanic is super interesting and while it requires supplemental materials, it plays very well. In order to play with contraptions, you must first construct a contraption deck consisting of as many contraption cards as you want. When a contraption is assembled, you place the top card of your contraption deck onto one of three sprockets tallied on yet another ancillary piece of cardboard. From there you just crank the sprockets to the next...you know what, it's a fun mechanic that plays out way better than it sounds when explained. The contraptions are largely fun, providing a wide array of bonuses at all power levels. There's enough variety at play here that you can play many games without having to worry about the experience feeling repetitive. Of course, building a deck with only a single abusive contraption is legal in limited, so I would suggest playing with a minimum of 3-5 if at all possible. Assembling contraptions is insular enough that it plays best when contained within the confines of Unstable, as you won't have a way to interact with your contraption deck otherwise. It's a poor fit for my cube in this way, but it's a ton of fun if you're just cracking packs of Unstable to draft with.
Assemble / Contraptions Grade: B+
Assemble / Contraptions Grade in Cube: F
Attractions are one of the keystone mechanics for Unfinity, and, like assembling contraptions, require you to build a secondary deck of attraction cards. When an effect allows you to build an attraction, you flip over the top card of your attraction deck and trigger its abilities (visit) at the start of your precombat main phase. When visiting attractions, you roll a d6 and trigger the ability listed if you roll one of the numbers highlighted on the righthand column of the card. While contraptions provide a guaranteed effect at regular intervals, attractions rely on randomness to provide any value at all. Playing as many attractions as possible can help to mitigate this randomness, but it also dilutes the chances of seeing your best effects. To make an outside the box comparison, playing with attractions feels like agreeing to play only the first couple turns of Machi Koro on repeat. For anyone that's played Machi Koro, that's easily the worst part of the game and can be immensely boring and frustrating. While attractions have the potential to be an interesting cost-benefit experiment, it more often leads to unsatisfying results within games. Attractions is a luck based mechanic that requires a secondary deck to play with, and that's just too many red flags for me to be interested in engaging with it.
Attractions Grade: D-
Attractions Grade in Cube: F
Augment / Host is the second major mechanic from the Unstable set, and it doesn't quite hit the high notes of its contemporary despite having some good gameplay patterns of its own. Augment / Host consists of two parts that are added together to make a functional Magic card. First, you have the host, a creature with an ETB ability that is capable of fusing with a creature with augment. Augment creatures do not have casting costs, and can only be played if they are augmented to a creature using their augment cost. Draw a hand full of augment creatures and no host creatures, and you can't actually cast any of your spells. Once augmented, your new creature has the power and toughness of the host adjusted by the modification listed on the augment. It also has the ability of the host that triggers whenever the augment states. There are some really fun and humorous combinations you can create that do some very cool things when combined. Creating a Half-Squirrel, Half-Crafty Octopus that assembles contraptions whenever a nontoken creature enters play is both hilarious and effective. There is a good amount of variety on display here and while some combinations are better than others, there are way more combinations than you can feasibly encounter in a given play session. This keeps the mechanic fresh as you look out for your favorite combinations or try to put together ones that work particularly well in your given deck. Like assembling contraptions, augmenting hosts just doesn't work when removed from the confines of Unstable, itself. It needs the density of effect too much to utilize elsewhere. That's okay though, because it's largely a success where it's intended to be played. My only frustration is that you really can get augment flooded, and having even one dead card in your hand can cost you a game. Your opponent can also augment flood you by removing your host creatures before you can augment them, effectively stranding multiple cards in your hand. Despite these gameplay concerns, there is a lot of joy to be had, and I'm glad I was able to play with the mechanic as it was intended.
Augment / Host Grade: B-
Augment / Host Grade in Cube: F
Best in show is another one off mechanic from Unfinity that only appears on a single card, Blue Ribbon. Anytime you cast a spell or activate an ability that targets a creature you control, you may copy it and target the creature who has best in show with the copy. This heroic-like ability has serious build around potential as long as you are playing a deck with both creatures and ways to target them. It synergizes with combat tricks, +1/+1 counters, blink, etc. If there were a way to make an opponent's creature best in show, you would be able to double up on removal, bounce, and other disadvantageous effects. The ability is problematic developmentally though, because if multiple creatures were to have best in show at the same time, a single trigger would allow you to copy your spell or ability infinitely. This makes the ability fun, but degenerate at higher densities of effect. Because of this, it's highly unlikely we will ever see a regular release version of this mechanic as printed. Nevertheless, it's an interesting design with build around potential that forces you to reevaluate cards you otherwise may not value as highly. That's the recipe for a successful design.
Best in Show Grade: B-
Best in Show Grade in Cube: B-
Blurry is the first mechanic so far that rewards people for taking off their clothes. Relax, it'll make sense in a minute. A creature with blurry cannot be blocked as long as your opponent was wearing glasses while it was cast. For a design that punishes people for having poor eyesight, I'm strangely happy that it checks whether eyeglasses were worn on casting instead of on resolution or when you declare your creature attacking. This prevents people from being able to simply remove their glasses once its in play, rendering the effect useless. Of course, if someone knows that there is a creature with blurry in a format, the correct line would be to wear contacts...or have better eyesight. You know, I'm just not in favor of punishing people for things that are out of their control, and I really don't like things that look at things outside of the actual game itself.
Blurry Grade: F
Blurry Grade in Cube: F
Ah yes, in response to your attack, I will remove my pants. This actually happened to me in a game involving Hurloon Wrangler in college. It wasn't great. I can't tell whether blurry is worse for asking someone with poor vision not to be able to see clearly for an entire game, or whether denimwalk is worse for doing absolutely nothing unless a player is too embarrassed to take off their pants. Both are pretty abysmal designs and eschew actual humor for physical comedy regarding actual players. I'm not a fan of that, as you'll see later in the article. For now, I'll have to settle for giving denimwalk the grade it deserves.
Denimwalk Grade: F
Denimwalk Grade in Cube: F
Dice rolling may have started out as an un-mechanic, but it's found a niche for itself with the Dungeons & Dragons sets. While I'm not really a fan of luck based mechanics, I am a huge fan of D&D, and the familiarity and resonance of rolling a d20 has done a marvelous job of making up for those gameplay patterns I may have otherwise found frustrating. They've also done a great job of making sure that players are largely rewarded regardless of what the result of the die roll is. Early cards like Chicken à la King reward you with something good on a great roll and provide no value at all on any other roll. Modern cards like Aberrant Mind Sorcerer grant you moderate value on a bad roll, and great value on a good roll. Ancient Bronze Dragon provides you with scalable value dependent on what your your roll actually is. Chittering Doom utilizes the binary success or failure style of dice rolling early cards implemented, but it lowers the threshold for success to increase the amount of times players accomplish something productive. Making sure players feel satisfied regardless of how lucky they may, or may not, be is key to making dice rolling fun. The more designers use the inherent variance of rolling dice to their advantage, the more fun the mechanic will be. It's still not to the point where I'd put any of those cards in my cube though. The relative power level of cards in the cube is high enough that I would not feel comfortable playing cards that NEED to roll high in order to be competitive.
Dice Rolling Grade: B
Dice Rolling Grade in Cube: F
I'm really stretching here to explain what these single card mechanics are designed to do. Anyway, gear up allows you to roll extra dice if you are wearing Magic branded clothing. At least this one is completely controllable by the player that is actually playing it. If you want to maximize gear up in a deck that features dice rolling, all you have to do is go buy some merch. You can nearly guarantee the dice result you want as long as you buy and wear enough layers of clothing, too. This is the kind of physical comedy I find amusing, because the person performing the physical comedy is the one that signed up for the experience. Again, more on how Magic executes on physical comedy later in the article. Gear up can serve a role in a very specific strategy that I just don't happen to be supporting in my personal cube. I find dice rolling to be too luck based to be satisfying and while gear up would potentially remove the luck element, it also defeats the purpose of the concept entirely. I feel like the people who like the thrill of rolling dice would be disappointed if they had zero randomness with this interaction. Nevertheless, the amount of randomness you mitigate is also up to your own discretion, so it's difficult to hold that against the mechanic too much.
Gear Up Grade: C+
Gear Up Grade in Cube: F
Gobble is a really weird mechanic, even for un-mechanic standards. In order to play with gobble, you need to have an actual food source on hand that you can eat from. You can also sacrifice Food tokens, but I digress. In the case of Pie-Eating Contest, you can select a new creature to target with each bite of food you take until you've either exhausted your available creatures, or filled your tummy. Aside from your appetite being a finite resource, debates over what constitutes a "bite" of food should be expected. Players using the ability are likely to consider nibbles acceptable, while their opponents are likely to demand to see cheeks puffing. Judge rulings aside, I generally don't want people to be eating or drinking while playing with my cards as there is a very real financial commitment made to constructing a cube. I don't think the upside of having a higher value of X is worth damaging your playing cards, or your digestive system.
Gobble Grade: F
Gobble Grade in Cube: F
Gotcha is one of my least favorite mechanics of all time, and it's not particularly close. Gotcha is a somewhat broadly defined mechanic that finds its basis in watching what your opponent does and says as they play a game of Magic, and then saying "Gotcha" if they do or say something that is detailed on a card with the mechanic. For example, if a player says a number out loud (I'll attack for 2), you can say "Gotcha", and return Number Crunch from your graveyard to your hand. You can also say "Gotcha" if they laugh, for any reason, and return Laughing Hyena from your graveyard to your hand. There are many more examples of things you need to be cautious of doing or saying while playing with cards with this mechanic. The specter of gotcha hanging over your head is so suffocating that the correct line of play is to sit quietly at your seat, saying nothing, doing nothing, touching nothing, and basically make no attempt to enjoy yourself in any way. That might seem dramatic, but I've played with the mechanic before, and it just results in people feeling uncomfortable. When someone triggers a gotcha card, they feel stupid. They feel like they did something wrong, when all they did was play the game and have fun. Gotcha actively sucks the fun and enjoyment out of the experience of playing Magic, and it's an easy exclusion from any cube that wants its players to enjoy themselves.
Gotcha Grade: F-
Gotcha Grade in Cube: F-
In order to properly understand the mechanism of jump, you have to go to the website listed on Devil K. Nevil and watch a two minute instructional tutorial video. That's not a great start when it comes to complexity, and it only escalates when you realize that jump is taken very literally. You see, in order to jump creatures, you need to hang the physical Devil K. Nevil card off the side of the table and flick it over whichever creatures you are trying to jump. I'm not going to get into specifics because there's a two minute instructional tutorial video you can watch. I'm generally not a fan of dexterity mechanics in games unless it's what the entire game is designed around. People that are uncoordinated or that don't feel comfortable performing physical tasks in front of others are put at a severe disadvantage for something that they can't help. If they sign up for the experience, that's one thing, but I don't like it being sprung on people when they aren't expecting it. This is why I would never add a mechanic like this to my cube. As far as dexterity mechanics go though, jump is an interesting push your luck mechanic at first glance. There is a certain amount of tension for both players when it comes to selecting a number of creatures to jump, and then a second threshold of tension for the jump itself. The novelty wears off pretty quickly once someone has practiced the task enough times though. Once you concretely know how many creatures you can jump reliably, that tension disappears and all you are left with is muscle memory. There are ways to mitigate this by introducing variety in your jumps, but there's very little strategic depth at play here, and because of that it lacks longevity at higher densities of effect. Lastly, there's a very real concern when it comes to damaging your Magic cards. I can easily see someone scuffing up their cards with poor flicking technique, and certain players are not going to want their opponent to touch their cards in any way, even if it's just to line up a jump.
Jump Grade: D-
Jump Grade in Cube: F
Jump in a log is a play on banding as it allows you to group up to four creatures together (in a log) until end of turn. These creatures then can't be blocked unless all of them are blocked, and spells or abilities that you control that target one of them, now target all of them. The wording of the mechanic leaves a bit of room for interpretation as it's not entirely clear whether a single creature blocks all four simultaneously, or if you need four creatures to block at the same time to block any of them. I'm going with the latter, but it's not worded very clearly. The natural synergy of jumping in a log comes with pump spells, allowing you to boost an entire team of attackers with a single Giant Growth. It also gives a deck that's trying to go wide the ability to attack an opponent relying on fewer blockers. In this way, you don't have to worry about chump attacking to deal chip damage, as you can get through with your entire log instead. Jump in a log snowballs quite quickly, especially when combined with removal or evasive creatures, and is very close to just making your entire team unblockable. A single Inkfathom Infiltrator, for example, makes the other three creatures in the log with it unblockable. Being tied to an attraction makes this less of a guaranteed trigger every turn, and that's probably for the best. This would get extremely frustrating to play against very quickly, as it's simply too difficult to interact with defensively. I actually sort of enjoy the joke, as it's very visual and silly, but the mechanic has almost no gameplay value at all beyond its synergy with pump spells.
Jump in a Log Grade: F+
Jump in a Log Grade in Cube: F
Just a second is a dexterity mechanic that utilizes a form of split second to ensure that players can't manipulate the board state to their advantage, thus nullifying your ability to resolve your spell favorably. I think this is a fantastic use of split second technology and while I don't normally like dexterity mechanics in games, I'm kind of partial to Slaying Mantis and Knife and Death because they play on real world comparisons the enhance the humor of the situation. A pro wrestling mantis that elbow drops your opponent's creatures is just as funny as you throwing knives at the board to skewer them. These jokes work, and they enhance the design of the mechanic. I still wouldn't include any cards with just a second in my cube due to my previous complaints with dexterity mechanics, but these at least work on their own successfully.
Just a Second Grade: D
Just a Second Grade in Cube: F
Last strike is an interesting addition to the strike family, as seen on only two cards from Unstable. As the name implies, last strike adds another stage of combat damage which now proceeds as follows: first strike damage, followed by regular combat damage, followed by last strike damage. Creatures with last strike can have a larger power than you would typically expect since they need to survive two stages of combat damage for their power to actually matter. Aside from this, last strike is technically a drawback as there is no strategic benefit to dealing your combat damage AFTER all other creatures. Of course, if there aren't any blockers then your arbitrarily large last strike creatures get to deal their combat damage to a player at their leisure. Regardless, the lack of interesting gameplay combined with the unnecessary lengthening of the combat damage step makes this feel more unnecessary than anything else.
Last Strike Grade: D-
Last Strike Grade in Cube: D-
Loose lips is another mechanic that relies entirely on the subjective interpretation of artwork to determine whether or not it actually does anything. In this case, it relates to any card that has an open mouth appear anywhere in its artwork. While only one creature exists with loose lips, Knight of the Kitchen Sink variant #3, one could imagine an extension of the ability beyond protection. Regardless of what loose lips actually affects, it's just not a very effective mechanic. Like art menace, loose lips on a greater scale would lead to countless judge calls of various degrees of legitimacy as players try to determine what constitutes a mouth and whether or not it is considered open. This is another one off joke that just doesn't land for me, and I'm glad it only appears on a single card.
Loose Lips Grade: F
Loose Lips Grade in Cube: F
Outside assistance is not a named mechanic so much as a recurring theme across the un-sets. Basically, I'm referring to any card that requires you to involve people in the surrounding area who are not a part of your active game. These effects often require you to find someone willing to participate in your game by choosing how a spell resolves from selecting legal targets, to looking at a players' hand, to asking them random questions that they may not have context clues for, to actually having them sit down and joining your game themselves. The success or failure of these effects is completely dependent on who happens to be around you. If it's a group of friends that have signed up to play with an un-set, and are aware of this possibility, it can be a load of fun as long as you aren't taking the games too seriously. If you're in a card shop surrounded by strangers who may not be willing to actively participate, it can be a frustrating and uncomfortable experience. I've had both immensely positive and negative experiences playing with these cards and while I love the idea in theory, it ultimately leads too much up to chance for me to be comfortable putting these cards in my cube. I don't want to have to rely on other people to help me win a game, and when someone resolves a spell in a way that is counterintuitive to what the caster wants, it can be awkward. I love the idea when used with the right group of people, it's just not something that works on a larger scale and can create enough discomfort that I would not want to experience this with any sort of regularity.
Outside Assistance Grade: C-
Outside Assistance Grade in Cube: D
Parade! is an ability word that requires a player to order their creatures sequentially before affecting each of them in turn. The effect escalates for each subsequent creature in the parade line, and provides bigger bonuses to whichever creature is in the back of the line. While there is only one card with parade!, Starlight Spectacular, the mechanic could be expanded to include opposing creatures, as well as your own. It's an obvious boon to decks looking to go wide with tokens and, when expanded, could serve as a metagame answer to those same decks. Because all effects need to target individual creatures, and each effect needs to be an ability that can be incremented, the actual design space of the mechanic seems to be quite narrow. It also only works when multiple creatures are in play, which makes it quite awkward post-wrath, or when drawn early in a game. It's very win-more in this way, as even a game that features lots of attrition mitigates the mechanic entirely. The shallowness of the design space, combined with the narrow window of play where it can even be effective, limits my interest in parade! to a mere novelty.
Parade! Grade: D
Parade! Grade in Cube: D
Physical comedy is certainly an acquired taste and your mileage may vary as to what you find enjoyable or entertaining. I feel comfortable with any cards that require the person casting them to do something silly, but I'm strongly opposed to cards that require your opponent to take part. If you want to pantomime a chicken to give Mesa Chicken flying until the end of turn, that's your prerogative, but please don't ask me to say Ow or throw a Clay Pigeon on my head. Thankfully, the vast majority of these effects only force your opponent to watch you act out, but it's still not something I really want to interact with on any level. I am positive a certain subset of player finds these effects hilarious, I'm just not that player.
Physical Comedy Grade: D-
Physical Comedy Grade in Cube: F
Rangeling is actually a very interesting and incredibly powerful ability considering that it only appears on a single card, and only in an un-set. Rangeling is an ability that only appears on lands, and makes the land in question every land type, including basic lands. This interacts favorably with domain, any effects that fetch lands from your library or graveyard, it counts towards your nonbasic lands when playing Urzatron or Cloudpost strategies, and it even can tap for any color of mana. In cube, it serves as an extra copy of all of these things without taking up more than one slot in your cube list or your deck. With all of this considered, it's certainly powerful enough to see cube play as long as you are willing to play a Transguild Promenade with significant upside. I'd go so far as to say that if you are running any sort of nonbasic land synergy, Nearby Planet is a must play as it does a fantastic job of maximizing its slot in the cube. I'm not playing any of those myself, so it's really just a fetchable Transguild Promenade which isn't quite what I'm looking for. As a mechanic, Rangeling would not work at higher densities of effect, as it's simply too difficult for development to print multiple copies of it. The design is super interesting though, and this is exactly what I had talked about when I mentioned using un-sets as a place to experiment safely.
Rangeling Grade: D+
Rangeling Grade in Cube: C+
Space sculptor appears on a single card, Space Beleren, and essentially splits the battlefield into three lanes. Each player must designate each of their creatures into one of the three lanes. Space Beleren, or whatever other theoretical cards that could care about lanes in the future, can then target, or affect, specific creatures in a given lane. This creates a very interesting minigame where players have to determine how much value each of their creatures has in each lane, and whether or not that value changes as the lane is shared with a given opposing creature. There is a ton of strategy here and you could easily design an entire game around this concept alone. As we currently stand, however, there's only one card that even acknowledges the existence of lanes. This results in the significant issue of introducing a new element that must be tracked for the remainder of the game that has no functional importance once Space Beleren leaves play. I tend to shy away from these types of effects in my cube as they add far too much unnecessary complexity for very little gain, and space sculptor is no exception. This is the reason I don't play with Daybound // Nightbound, and there is far more active support for that at the appropriate power levels for cube. Space sculptor is an interesting, interactive mechanic that has untouched layers of strategic depth. It just may not be worth the complexity and board tracking that would be inherently involved to support it.
Space Sculptor Grade: D
Space Sculptor Grade in Cube: F
Stickers are the other keystone mechanic of Unfinity and it is easily one of my least favorite mechanics of all time. Stickers are temporary adhesives that you can put on your cards to augment them in various ways. Many stickers require you to pay a certain amount of tickets for you to use them. Tickets are a currency unique to Unfinity that serve no purpose other than to manipulate stickers. The tracking of stickers involves a multitude of sticker books that contain different combinations of stickers with abilities that augment the power and toughness of creatures or granting them additional abilities. Stickers stay on permanents as they move between zones unless they are returned to your hand or the game ends. Like the paper counters many recent mechanics have utilized, stickers need to be maintained separately from the cards they are played with, often leading to frustration when it comes to storage and handling. This is exacerbated by normal wear and tear stickers experience, which renders them unable to adhere to the cards and sticker books. Even if stickers were able to work as intended, there is a massive amount of strategic complexity associated with their use simply due to the sheer amount of different sticker books available. Making sure each player has access to the right amount of sticker books, and that the stickers on those books are balanced for each player quickly becomes unwieldly. It's not feasible to optimize this experience, and players would be unwise to try. While this is less of a concern in limited than in constructed, it still creates significant headaches for designers looking to utilize them. I appreciate the ingenuity and experimentation with new printing technologies at play here, but I would just prefer to not have to engage with them at all. This is less about something breaking an unwritten rule or creating an experience that's "not my Magic", and more about a mechanic that creates more frustrations than it does enjoyment.
Stickers / Tickets Grade: D-
Stickers / Tickets Grade in Cube: F-
Sticker kicker is an extension of the sticker mechanic and grants all of your creatures kicker 
. If you pay the kicker cost, you get one ticket and can immediately put a sticker on the creature whose spell you kicked. Obviously, this mechanic only works within the confines of a sticker based environment, so it seems unfair to grade it based on those rather low metrics. As such, I'm not going to give sticker kicker a cube grade, since it only works with a mechanic that's been ruled out of consideration. I do like the design when taken for what it is, though. Being able to utilize stickers without having to use tickets as a form of currency streamlines an overly complicated mechanic. It may be too powerful of an effect at larger frequencies, but it at least gives players something to be excited about. It also gives you something to do with your mana, although that has more to do with kicker being fantastic than stickers themselves. Sticker kicker is relatively easy to understand, and intelligently utilizes existing infrastructure to enhance the execution of an underwhelming mechanic.
Sticker Kicker Grade: B-
Sticker Kicker Grade in Cube: N/A
Switch is an ability only seen on Mary O'Kill from Unstable, and it allows you to exchange either a Mary or a Killbot creature on the battlefield with another from your hand if you pay the switch cost. The creature from your hand enters play in the same state as the creature that it was switched with, including being tapped, equipped, enchanted, etc. For all intents and purposes, the two creatures are only exchanging locations. Switch can be used to replace an attacking creature with one from your hand, in a way that resembles Ninjutsu, except that your creature doesn't need to be unblocked to activate it. You can also dodge removal, replace a blocker, retrigger any enters the battlefield or leave play effects, move equipment at a lower cost than equipping, etc. Because switch doesn't specify ownership, you can even switch a qualifying creature an opponent controls with one from your hand. The fact that there are no restrictions on when you can activate the ability makes it immensely powerful when played with enough support, especially at such a low mana cost. It's actually quite dangerous in this way, allowing you to skirt on mana requirements and continuously reshape combat whenever you have priority. It allows you to turn early game creatures into more significant threats your opponent has paid mana for. It's so flexible that it actually makes participating in creature combat kind of a nightmare. As long as you have mana up, your opponent is incapable of doing proper combat math on offense or defense, as you could always have a better creature waiting to be switched in. This makes it difficult to imagine supporting it at lower rarities or in higher numbers as the more creatures you have that can switch, the more frustrating the experience for your opponent. Once both players have switchable creatures, the gameplay simply becomes untenable for everyone. Switch is an example of what happens when you design something with no levers to control its functionality. While many players may applaud the freedom it allows, the gameplay is objectively worse for it.
Switch Grade: D
Switch Grade in Cube: D-
Triple strike is the last of the strike family I need to discuss for this article, and it allows a creature to deal first strike damage, regular combat damage, and last strike damage all within a single combat. Between the inherent complexity of incorporating three different combat steps, one of which has a ton of baggage of its own, and a creature with the ability having to deal a minimum of 3 damage total, it would be very challenging to balance triple strike on a wider scale. It's unlikely that you could even print it at lower rarities. Like last strike, triple strike creates an expansion of combat that just isn't necessary, adding complexity without making it strategically meaningful.
Triple Strike Grade: F
Triple Strike Grade in Cube: F
Typelink is the generic phrasing of the ability seen on Earl of Squirrel that translates any combat damage dealt to players into Squirrel tokens. This can be extended to any creature type or token, and has been seen unnamed on cards like Living Hive, for Insect tokens, and Lathril, Blade of the Elves, for Elf Warrior tokens. Typelink is an ability that requires restraint and normally appears on either expensive creatures, those of higher rarity, or both. This is because of how much the ability snowballs when unopposed, and it's this nature that makes it difficult to expand the design to any meaningful level. It's a great candidate to return on individual cards every couple of years, but you wouldn't be able to reasonably make it a key mechanic in a set. That said, typelink can be an exciting, splashy, flavorful addition to a card that cares deeply about a particular creature type. It can also be a key uncommon in a draft archetype if the set calls for it, see Rapacious One. I'm not sure there is much to be gained from codifying the ability the way Earl of Squirrel did very often, as it just adds to an already bursting lexicon for a very narrow payoff, but the ability can do a lot of good when leveraged thoughtfully.
Typelink Grade: B-
Typelink Grade in Cube: B
It took me a couple of reads to understand what Undeathtouch actually does. At first, I thought they had keyworded the Incendiary Flow ability that exiles a creature if it would die after being dealt damage by something. In fact, what it does is exile a creature in lieu of dealing damage at all. This ability is limited to combat involving creatures from both graveyards, and not the actual battlefield. This makes it incredibly narrow and nearly impossible to design around on a larger scale without making wholesale changes to how combat is written. It's a true execution of an un-mechanic in that it's both incredibly obtuse and complex, and yet somehow intuitive in a way that only kinda, sorta fits within the actual rules of the game. Like so many other un-mechanics it only appears on a single card, Over My Dead Bodies, and that's absolutely intentional. In practice, it's an immensely powerful ability that single handedly would make it nearly impossible for traditional control decks to win a game involving any deck containing creatures. It invalidates most removal entirely, creates repetitive board states where the same creatures are involved in combat far longer than warranted, and it's extremely abusive with any self mill or discard. Between the poor gameplay patterns that undeathtouch creates, and the invalidation of entire strategies it would cause, it's difficult to imagine anything good coming from this mechanic appearing at higher frequencies.
Undeathtouch Grade: D
Undeathtouch Grade in Cube: D-
Wordy is a recurring un-mechanic that refers to spells that have 4 or more lines of rules text. Note that this excludes reminder text as that, while technically wordy in execution, actually reduces comprehension complexity. It's funny to think that R&D had the self-awareness all the way back in 2004 to poke fun at their own handiwork considering how wordy cards have become on average in the modern day. One could argue that so many cards would qualify as wordy nowadays, that the mechanic has lost all meaning, and the joke wouldn't even be understandable. At the time it was clever, self-aware, and humorous, I just worry that modern audiences would actually be more annoyed than entertained if playing with it. After all, complexity creep has become enough of a mainstream topic that many players have a visceral reaction to it even being discussed. Even without taking gut feelings into account, wordy just isn't that satisfying to trigger or play with. Such a high percentage of cards trigger it that it almost reads "whenever a player casts a spell" independent of the card box. You're honestly going to have a greater emotional response when cards don't trigger it more than you will when they do. Wordy is as much of a in-joke as it is an actual mechanic, and neither has aged well with the game.
Wordy Grade: C
Wordy Grade in Cube: D
Grading un-mechanics was an interesting exercise in cost-benefit analysis, hypothetical projection, and design theory. Nearly all of these mechanics have only shown up in a single set, and many of them were only printed on a single card. Figuring out whether any of them would work in larger quantities, or even outside of their own environment, was pretty rewarding. I'm glad to cross off such a large chunk of ungraded mechanics, especially since they are unlikely to be reprinted. The grades ultimately don't really mean anything, but it's a nice benchmark and comparison point to have when evaluating new mechanics. Next up is a similar exercise, but for the various Commander and multiplayer set mechanics. I'll also be discussing some variant modes of play mechanics in the same article. I hope you enjoyed this change of pace as we approach Modern Horizons 3 and the ominously large list of mechanics to discuss in that set. Until then though, may all of your packs contain a card for your cube.