Welcome to the Inclined Plane. We are here to drive a Mayhem Devil-shaped wedge through the heart of the Simic Combine. This cube is about high-octane frenzies, efficient synergies vs. tap-out greed, and Kaalia vs. Marchesa rocket tag. Chase your dreams by crushing your opponents'.
Will you curve from Ragavan into Hellrider, shred your opponent's hand before they can get online, outlast the onslaught to deploy a string of must-answer threats, or find your own way? Drafting strategies are tied to synergies between cards rather than according to color groups, and with no blue or green cards—burning-tree emissary and khenra spellspear partially excepted—you can pursue your most reckless ambitions on a level battlefield. And battle you will: games in this cube are about trading escalating blows on your way to the top.
The speed of a given matchup will depend on the decks, but it will behoove you to have a plan to deal with a curve of efficient threats if your deck wants to get to play a longer game. is mostly a singleton cube, with some land doubles to make mana bases work well and equitably when there are only three colors. It is designed toward drafts of 8 players and 1v1 matches, but will be fun for anything you can do with a 360-card cube. An 8-player draft will typically have a few mono-color decks, one or two decks trying to play all three colors, and the balance in a pair of the three available colors.
The raw power level of cards in this cube is fairly high, but it is not trying to recreate specific play patterns only from Legacy or Vintage though it draws from the pool of cards legal in those eternal formats. It’s important to have a plan to contest the monarchy, but because there are so many monarch cards none of them is a boogeyman. Some available synergies will also be familiar to commander players who have built decks in these colors. Fun and powerful directions you can take your draft include but are certainly not limited to:
There are no infinite combos, and Kaalia is the only way to cheat in big creatures at less than 5 mana. Aggro, control, and midrange decks are all viable and there are plenty of ways to vote for a big game or a small game.
Header image by wizardtower.com
Archived versions of this cube featured at California Cube Champs 2023 and CubeCon 2024
I am making good on my fiendish intent to give skitterspike a try. Solemn is an all-star of a card but I don’t want more colorless creatures so it can take a break until I’m convinced skitterspike can’t work here.
Rollercrusher Ride is exciting in some of the same decks and has the catnip words “deals double that damage instead”, so losing shatterskull smashing hurts a little but I feel it’s the right swap over other candidates.