Cleaning up some additional cuts to get back down to 540. Will likely be adding an additional 10 or so cards to test in place.
Large adjustment for 2024!
Some overall design changes:
I've significantly reduced the number of double-faced cards in the Cube, as well as completely eliminating any cards that provide -1/-1 counters.
Some archetype specific changes:
"Blink" as a UW focused archetype has been completely removed. It was consistently under preforming due to the speed it requires to establish it's setup. Some auxiliary cards often targeted by Blink decks outside of UW were also removed to discourage players from attempting to latch on to the remnants of that archetype, in individually powerful cards. UW is moving towards a traditional control archetype, to provide a little more anti-aggro tools.
Black and Green, both together and individually, have a much stronger focus on graveyard based synergies. These two colors had the weakest identities (also having the least artifact synergies) so a strong push was made to establish them as the recursion colors. Other cards are on-deck to reinforce these focuses if the current setup isn't enough.
In addition to Black and Green, both Blue and Red have added a couple more tools to move cards into the discard pile.
"Reanimator" as an archetype can be a combination of several colors, with more cards allowing themselves to be moved directly from hand to the discard pile.
Some changes to test part 1 of cards from LCI (plus a few others).
Next up- looking at more potential depth for RW exile, GB graveyard, Gx lands and Bx reanimator as archetypes. Those last 3 will likely have significant overlap and will come together as an update. Look for decent sized changes in those two colors.
W and B currently slightly over represented, but have been performing well and happen to continue to get tools that I want to support.
After over two years... I have finally updated my Cube here on Cube Cobra!
Due to the amount of changes that occurred to this list, there unfortunately isn't a clean way to add and subtract, since my physical Cube is many deviations different from this one.
Some notes on changes here:
I continue to lean into artifacts as a major theme of the Cube, still primarily in W/U/R but also touching into B and G with some synergy pieces to allow drafts to cook.
The speed of the Cube has also increased still, which is a feature and not a bug.
I've moved towards jettisoning some mechanics completely, including Monarch, Nightbound/Daybound, and Level-Up (though Hexdrinker remains... for now). This is mainly to center play experience and reduce mental load, though I would definitely consider adding cards back in that would be the only ones present with their mechanic if it otherwise met design goals- those cards just really need to justify their existence.
Green is currently in the middle of an identity crisis- cards are individually strong but cohesiveness can struggle due to going through so many changes. Look for another large change with the next update to Green and Green/x cards, likely making another run at graveyard strategies and land strategies, which work well together.