Sins of the Father

Son of Cubemo - bright-eyed and optimistic - the spawn of infamous Cubemo. The very antithesis of his father, and yet with nearly identical genetic makeup.

Truly this is the cruel irony of lineage: We are what we are not.

About Me

The goal of Son of Cubemo? We ball.

Can we achieve true balance between the Contested Trinity: Aggro, Midrange, Control... can there be harmony or are they destined for discord? Draft it and see.

Card printings in the physical version will always aim to maximize DRIP (except lands so packs are easier to decipher at a glance), but rarely at the expense of rules text. This is especially for wacky, silly mechanics like Blitz and Reconfigure that are largely intuitive in practice, but still have niche synergies that rely on familiarity with the underlying mechanics.

The Rule of Cule: To be included, a card must induce at least One Goosebump™ upon reading its text.

In power level terms, this cube feels like it lands somewhere around or just above Pioneer. No combo decks here (unless you consider ramping with elves and rocks to be a combo, which is valid, I'll give you that).

I've got doubles of the fetches, and doubles of the shocks. Triples of the Nova (there is only one copy of Cleansing Nova).

How to Draft Me

No special draft rules, just the usual 3 packs of 15 cards each, 1 card per pick, 40 card minimum deck size.

When drafting in paper, I highly recommend taking your time and looking at each card since I have no self-control. Many of the printings I've included look nothing like the "classic" versions of classic cards. You don't want to rush a pick only to realize later that you missed a better card because you didn't recognize it. The way I justify this is that the unfamiliarity should force you as a drafter to re-read cards with a fresh set of eyes and potentially open your mind to new synergies.

Suggested/"Supported" Deck Archetypes

Whatever the fuck that means :^)

Ultimately, just draft things that feel coherent to you. Colors are pretty forgiving and there are a lot of overlapping strategies - plenty of cards to share!

The aggro - midrange - control spectrum is represented in some fashion in each color to varying degrees. My goal was to make deck archetype viable but also answerable. I do want some games to feel like rock/paper/scissors matchups to incentivize drafting a new deck every time you play and making sideboard picks.

In a general sense, the guilds will tend towards these strategies:
Azorius
Dimir
Rakdos
Gruul
Selesnya
Orzhov
Izzet
Golgari
Boros
Simic

Azorius

/ - Control, thanks to broad answers and resilient, inevitable win conditions.

Alternatively, blink, thanks to value-oriented ETB creatures and playable blink engines.

These strategies mesh well thanks to the advantage that the ETB creatures tend to provide on the tempo axis, but you have quite a bit of leeway to either move into a strict denial- or removal-oriented control plan, or commit to a board presence. Esper and Bant builds will likely have a white + blue core for the control/blink backbone elements.

Dimir

/ - Dimir is probably the best path for the current iteration of Reanimator in the cube, or a good path for a more creature-focused control list than a plain-old counterspell build.

There is also potential for a lean midrange deck in Dimir when the right cards come your way, but that type of list may benefit from a third color splash or being focused in a different color pair splashing blue or black.

Rakdos

/ - Aggro + sacrifice.

What does anyone do with Rakdos but sacrifice? This archetype is split with black + white, with white or Orzhov cards providing some solid additional bodies-per-card or drain effects.

Gut, Judith, and Mayhem Devil are all strong threats without requiring a full commitment to a sacrifice deck, as are proactive attackers like Forsaken Miner and Rankle.

Gruul

/ - Stompy Mode.

Your goal with the red + green pairing is to get more creature power from your mana. You are well-suited to taking over the early-game board with "mana-doublers" like Burning-Tree Emissary and Bloodbraid Elf, but your threats should also scale into the late game. Pair these up with some of black + green's answers and efficient bodies and you're in for a very potent Jund build.

Selesnya

/ - This is the other side of the blink deck, here more focused on board presence.

Going wide via token creation or pairing with red for a Naya Zoo type build (sorry Wild Nacatly fans, I didn't go all in) or an Abzan build that plays in and out of the graveyard also have a green + white core.

I will say that green + white has the least of a specific identity as a guild here, but it provides a very strong card quality backbone for any of the three-color groupings it exists within.

Orzhov

/ - This is also a solid aggro color pairing like red + white, but is also loaded with aristocrats elements.

The white creatures or spells can bring several bodies for only one card, and black provides sac outlets and can drain out the opponent.

These colors also have good proactive attacking stats in general, so a straight-forward aggro deck without the aristocrats synergies is viable here as well.

I am also very much hoping someone tries to recreate the old Mardu Pyromancer deck in here one day, but no one has tried it yet :^(

Izzet

/ - It's spells, Izzet? Yes it is.

Not much to say here since this is not a very flexible color pair.

Black or white may contribute some extra elements to round out a spells deck, since cantrips and burn spells tend to get snatched up quickly by all decks that can run them in a draft.

Watch the signals early and you'll be left with a resilient build that operates a bit outside the realm of the rest of the archetypes. Try to force it and you may be left with an incoherent mess. That's Izzet, baby.

Golgari

/ - Midrange bullshit. These are the colors that bring the late-game inevitability to Jund. I don't really see black + green get drafted without a splash for another color, but it does have some beefy power/toughness stat lines.

Splash in blue for a more late game oriented value/grind deck.

Go into red or white for more sacrifice-oriented or go-wide lists, respectively.

Hogaak is in here. Never seen it get drafted. Maybe one day the stars will align.

Boros

/ - Another early game proactive aggro deck. Get your board swinging ASAP to go under all the greedy late-game decks, then reach over the top of their BS during the midgame with some extra burn damage. Price of Progress, Boros Charm, Fireblast, or Hellrider are likely finishers.

I don't think there's another way to build this pair really, just be careful about trying to balance your split between both colors. You are much better off leaning heavily into one color (especially on one-drops) to be able to cast your spells consistently.

Simic

/ - Ramp.

This can be done in mono-green as well of course, but the benefit of blue is adding ways to make it to the late game more consistently. Scalable counterspells like Condescend or draw effects like Hydroid Krasis will fill this role.

There are also a decent quantity of creatures with flash in these colors. Perhaps there is a control build that allows you to hold up either spells or creatures on your opponent's turn? Which should also pair nicely with the blink spells in white? Who's to say?

Colorless

- Just here to help out, there is not an artifact build to try out. Sorry, I built a whole other cube for that though so I don't really care about having it here.

I don't feel like there are any traps here really. Note that there are none of the usual two-card combos though, so pulling pieces in the hopes that a corresponding combo card will appear will be fruitless.

There are no payoffs specific to equipment, though there are some decent equipment in the list.

The very top tier under "power" cards are not welcome here, so no Oko, Minsc & Boo, Ragavan, free-roll or fast mana artifacts, etc. The only "free" spells are Bloodghast, Fireblast, Grief, Gitaxian Probe, Once Upon a Time, and Subtlety.

Though there are counters synergies and some great token generators, I wouldn't say that either of those are explicitly supported archetypes. Rather, they support more vague strategies that would fit into the styles of decks listed above.

If you come across any combos I haven't noticed or anything that seems inconsistent with the goals I have outlined above, please call my ass out!!