Art by Randy GallegosThe Duel Cube is a 200-card deck across all colors. Duel Cube is played just like normal Magic but with a few unique zones and rules.
Unique Zones & PhasesThe Library - Players share the Duel Cube as their library. If an effect would refer to any player's library, it refers to the shared library instead. (They don't share ownership of any other zone.)
The Reserve - An infinite supply of basic lands outside the game.
The Queue - A rapidly changing group of ten cards that sit face-down, near the library.
Draft Phase - A phase between turns where both players may draft cards from the queue.
Special Rules- Players can't mulligan. After drawing their opening hand, each player then chooses any number of cards to place on the bottom of the library. For each card chosen this way, that player may put a basic land from the reserve into their starting hand. (The basic lands chosen in this way are hidden information.)
- Between turns, starting with the active player, each player looks at the queue and may swap any number of cards in their hand with those cards; this is called the Draft phase. Once two draft phases have passed, the queue is placed on the bottom of the library in a random order, then refilled from the top of the library.
- Once a card has left the library or the queue, its owner becomes the player who removed it from that zone. If a card is put back into the queue or library, it becomes disowned.
Well, it's that time to gut the cube from top to bottom again. While reading about Caleb Gannon's new game Algomancy, I became interested in his method of live-drafting. I've rebuilt my own Dual Cube around this new system (as best I could), we'll see how it plays out if I ever draft this thing again.