The Dream

What if the MTGO Vintage Cube was designed more like a draftable set?

---

The Rules

Cards

• Singleton
• Not every card will show up in every draft, and cards at higher rarity are less likely to appear.

Packs

• Each pack must have a structure similar to purchasable draft boosters
• 1 mythic or rare
• 3 uncommons
• 10 commons
• 1 guaranteed land (common)

Legality

• All paper cards are potentially legal.
• This includes silver-bordered cards, acorn cards, Secret Lair cards, Universes Beyond and other crossover products.
• It does not include Alchemy or other digital-only cards.

Printings

• All cards must be at a rarity they have been printed at in paper.
• This means Vintage Masters does not count.
• If the version of a card included is not at its intended rarity in the cube, the sleeve will be marked to indicate its actual rarity.
• Iconic cards are preferable to less-iconic counterparts.

Cube Size

• The cube size is not critical, it can vary somewhat to create the distribution we require.
• For ease of management, I'm trying to keep it around 540.

Rarities

• Rarity determines how often a card is used, not every card is used in every draft.
• Commons are always used.
• Two thirds of the Uncommons are used.
• Rares do not have a specific target, but there should be enough of them that any given rare is less than one-third likely to show up.
• It could be much less than one-third, depending on playtesting.
• The rare slot is intended to be very flexible, so new cards can be swapped in at any time.
• Mythics are treated like rares and added to the rare slot.
• The only rule here is trying to keep a high proportion of rares to mythics for aesthetic reasons, making it feel more like a draft booster.

Preferences

• No cards with mechanics that feel designed for multiplayer.
• Notably, this means no Monarch or Initiative cards, or voting cards, even if these are now iconic to Vintage Cube environments.
• Also no cards with text like, "Choose a Background" or "This can be your commander." (unless it's "Partner with" since that has an effect in non-commander decks)
• Un-cards with physical gameplay or otherwise too-goofy effects are unlikely to appear.
• Crossover cards have to fit my personal aesthetic preferences, usually keeping with a general fantasy theme. (Very unlikely to see Walking Dead, 40k, etc.)
• Trying to avoid cards with text that suggests they have an unsupported theme, like synergy with a card type not included in this environment.
• Nostalgic and iconic cards are preferable to other cards with a similar effect. If we want a XR burn spell, we're going to start with Fireball and not Burn From Within.

Power

• TBD
• The cube is meant to emulate powerful, iconic cube environments such as the MTGO Vintage Cube, as such it is possible to include power.
• For the purposes of this discussion, "power" should be understood to include Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, etc, and not necessarily include Timetwister.
• It is not yet decided if power will be available, it may be cut if it detracts from the overall experience.
• If included, it is not yet decided what rarity the power will appear at
• There may be special rules for power to make it work in this environment, even if this is an exception to behaving like normal draft boosters.
• Right now, power is included at its normal rarity.

Basic Lands

• Basic lands are provided, but not snow lands.
• Snow is not currently a supported theme, and if it becomes one, snow lands will probably be drafted since that's how Kaldheim worked.

---

The Numbers

Lands - 24? (Could be higher)
Commons - 240 (Needs to be exact)
Uncommons - 108 (Needs to be close)
Rares - 140-ish
Mythics - 28-ish

---

Q&A

Why do this?

Reason A:
I'm a huge nerd who drafts the MTGO cube a lot.

Reason B:
I think rarity is a good thing. I think power level disparity is, in some cases, a good thing. One thing I don't like about some cube formats is that the power level can be very flat. I hear a lot of content creators saying, "Cube is great, you can choose what you want to do." But when I draft, I don't want to choose a lane, I want to try and puzzle out what the right lane is. Personal preference can play a role, but I enjoy the puzzle of figuring out the right pick.

In a standard draft set, this is created by two major elements - rares and power level disparity at common. If you open a powerful rare, you're now strongly incentivized to draft that color. Or if you're in a position where you see powerful commons coming late (past 3rd pick, usually) then it also gives you a signal what you should be doing. This push/pull aspect is what makes drafting these sets so rewarding. Is this a signal, or are you being setup to fail in pack 3? Is it worth fighting over this rare, even though the color isn't open?

I think the MTGO Vintage Cube (and similar cubes) actually succeed in solving this problem by including power. If you take a Mox Ruby, you'll probably play it in any deck... but wouldn't you like to be playing red now? Is it worth fighting over the powerful blue cards? The way it works is, the power level isn't flat.

I think this is why I enjoy the Vintage Cube experience over the Arena Cube or many other cubes. They're all fun, but the inclusion of power doesn't just mean you're doing strong things, it also means your draft experience is a trickier puzzle.

This isn't an attempt to fix the Vintage Cube, it's an homage to what I like about it. I think this format of "draft booster cube" (need a better name) has a role to play in cube design, and I intend to make more of them in the future.

I think rarity is a useful tool for draft, and this is an attempt to demonstrate that to myself and anyone else who's interested.

Why so many cards? Aren't sets usually between 300-400 cards, not 540?

My goal isn't to make a set, it's to make a draft experience that feels like the best parts of both a set and a cube.

Since I'm sticking to the singleton rule, I need to fill out the common slot with more cards. A normal set has about 100 commons, and a table opens about 240 commons, so I need more commons.

I also believe (and this cube will test this belief) that more rares is usually more fun. Each rarity slot serves a purpose - commons are the building blocks of the format, uncommons round out with more specialized effects, and rares/mythics are the spice and chaos on top. More rares = more spice.

Okay, then why stick to singleton?

It might be wrong.

I dunno, maybe I need more redundancy at my common level in a way that only duplicates can provide.

But "restrictions breed creativity" as MaRo says, and singleton is a classic cube restriction.

I think that, if it works, it's more fun than breaking singleton. Let's try it and see if it works. If it isn't fun, I'm open to changing this rule for commons.

Why not include Palace Jailer or other cube staples?

Here's my take on monarch and other made-for-multiplayer cards: They're lame.

It's purely my personal preference. If you disagree, I think that's totally understandable. I've gone back and forth on it, but this is where I landed. And I'm only referring to singleplayer formats, I think they're quite fun in multiplayer games.

Personally, I think the game is more fun when these made-for-multiplayer cards aren't included. The gameplay patterns are sometimes fun, but they don't feel "right". And that feeling is important!

The voting cards are even worse. "Each player gets a vote, so we'll always just do the thing that happens when you tie." It's painful to read those cards.

If, for some reason, I need to bring them in, I'm not allergic to it. But for now, I'm going to create my personal dream experience, and Palace Jailer isn't in it.

It's my cube, so my preferences take priority.

Why not downshift cards, or otherwise adjust rarity yourself?

"Restrictions breed creativity" is a cliche, but it's not totally untrue.

I work better when there's rules. It's fun to solve problems. If you can just change properties of cards, you aren't solving problems, you're cheating. (According to the rules of the made-up game I'm playing with myself here.)

Honestly, I might have to do it. Golgari has terrible commons. It's embarrassing. Everyone knows golgari archetypes are underwhelming in recent sets, but it goes back so much further than I thought.

Having a good draft experience is more important than keeping printed rarities, but for now I'm not making that compromise.

Plz print good golgari commons in the next set, WotC.

Are you keeping color balance? Same number of cards of each color?

Yep. At each rarity too. Maybe less important at Rare, but I think if you look at the cube list, you won't feel like one color got priority over another.

It's another rule to set for myself. Magic has five colors, they're supposed to be equal.

There's some grey room around the edges with split and hybrid cards. Something like Life // Death is usually Death, so it's something like... 75% a black card?

I dunno, it makes sense to me.

How do I playtest this?

I'm not done making it yet! When I am, I'll tackle this problem.