2/4 Player Red & White Micro Cube
Disclaimer: This is my first attempt at a 1v1 Cube, especially a "powered" one and I have no personal experience with Legacy or Vintage constructed
Summary and Draft Procedure
180 card Micro Cube for 2 or 4 Players
Red, White, and Colorless cards only
Decks
Decks present include:
- Mono Red Aggro
- Mono White Aggro
- Various "Combo decks" (supported by White "Stax"/Control)
- "Artifact Matters" (supported by White "Stax"/Control)
Drafting the Cube
2 Players: Grid Draft
4 Players: Booster Draft, 5 packs of 9upp
(I have no intention to play this cube with either 3 or more than 4 players at this time)
Background and Design
I'm looking to build a cube that I might be able to pull out with my regular Commander pod every now and again to see if I can get them more interested in 1v1 Magic. I also wanted to create another way to play with just two players as just playing two Commander decks 1v1 can be very hit and miss.
I wanted to keep this cube as small as possible physically to cap the amount of time, money, and physical space this would take up to actually put together in paper and bringing it with me to our regular Magic nights.
Why Boros?
Well, why not? I'd like to say I had a well thought out decision process that led me towards Red/White or that I have a burning passion for Boros but neither is really true. I first thought about making this cube monocolored and thought "maybe black?" but felt there's already so many mono-black cubes out there so I started looking for something different which made me change course and consider allowing two colors in the cube.
So in the end, my thought process was a mix of "well if not black then white seems flexible in what it does", an odd interest in the "white counterspells" such as Lapse of Certainty and Mana Tithe (no Blue? no problem!), the fleeting thought of "hey burn might be cool?" (although I ended up cutting the Burn deck from the cube for now), and the self-awareness that I'm not very good at playing Aggro decks so this could be an excuse for me to force myself to think about building and learning to play aggressive decks.
So here we are - Red and White.
What cards / themes were the 'starting point' for this cube?
As I started thinking about "themes" to include in the cube, I was overcome with the sudden thought of "hey why don't I throw in lots of powerful cards like Black Lotus and the Moxen in, where else am I ever going to get a chance to actually play with them? Also I have this Lion's Eye Diamond in my collection that I probably won't ever fit in a Commander deck, so maybe I can shoehorn this one in somehow?
Disclaimer: At this point I should probably clarify that I am a complete noob when it comes to 'powered' cubes or 'powerful cards'. I don't play, watch, or follow Legacy or Vintage formats and have no interest in ever doing so, so this cube is built with complete ignorance to any 'established wisdoms' from those formats or any existing expertise around how 'best' to play with cards such as Lotus, Moxen, even other 'powerful' cards like Urza's Saga etc.
Including all the Fast Mana and building around the LED combos also made me want to include an "Artifact deck" in this cube, partly because that would then also allow me to put in the card Mishra's Workshop - another card that I'd otherwise never see/play but is powerful/infamous/... and therefore appealed to me.
Ultimately, the red and white cards largely resemble the selection in the MTGO Vintage Cube, with a few more artifacts sprinkled in and the odd card that I saw on constructed deck lists for Legacy and Vintage and was curious to try in a cube environment.
Combos and 'broken' stuff
Reminder: As mentioned above, I am very ignorant of some of these combos and how they would typically feature in constructed formats, I'm just throwing stuff together that looks like it might work and the descriptions below probably reflect that lol - it's also entirely possible that I am missing other combos and interactions in my cube that would be blatantly obvious to more experienced players.
LED
Right, Lion's Eye Diamond started me down the road of including 'power' in this cube, so the primary combo in Boros that I found is
This results in "infinite Mana" (and an empty hand). The simplest way to use the infinite Mana for an instant win would be Walking Ballista by either having it already in play or in the graveyard to be brought back with the ability from Auriok Salvagers. Retrofitter Foundry, Stonecoil Serpent and Monastery Mentor are other ways of converting infinite mane into game-ending threats, albeit less 'guaranteed' ones.
Main support for the above combo are Urza's Saga and Enlightened Tutor which can both find LED. Imperial Recruiter to help find Auriok Salvagers.
Also, Black Lotus will of course work just as well as LED in this case but with the added benefit of you get to keep your hand, enabling Electrodominance and Forth Eorlingas! to become viable combo end points.
Stoneforge Mystic
The other "big one" in here is around Stoneforge Mystic, by combining it with Kaldra Compleat to cheat out a big, game-ending threat early.
There are also 'fairer' Equipments in the cube like Lion Sash, Nettlecyst, or Anduril, Flame of the West in case the combo above does not materialise during the draft.
Perhaps the best supported as both Imperial Recruiter and Recruiter of the Guard can find Stoneforge Mystic?
Through the Breach
Finally, there's Through the Breach and big creatures that can be cheated out with it such as Emrakul, the Aeons Torn and Blightsteel Colossus
Perhaps the least supported as there's no way to tutor for Through the Breach or Emrakul, the Aeons Torn - only Blightsteel Colossus can be found with Enlightened Tutor.
Closing Thoughts
For now I need to playtest this cube and see whether this makes for at all entertaining gameplay, fingers crossed it won't go horribly wrong!
Ok some more reasonably big changes following more bot drafts. Most notably I decided to take Burn as an archetype out to make space for more flexible cards. Also took out Underworld Breach as there wasn't anything meaningful that this card would enable in this cube and I didn't want to offer up any more combos in this deck.
Many bot drafts later the Mono-coloured aggro decks seem to come together nicely, as do the more 'broken' decks around the Auriok Salvagers and Stoneforge Mystic, perhaps only the combo with Through the Breach is slightly harder to hit consistently as there's less tutors in the cube that would enable more consistency for it. Could even consider cutting Emrakul, the Aeons torn as Blightsteel Colossus at least can be tutored to hand via Enlightened Tutor but for now Emrakul is 'too cool' a card to be cut.
Looking forward to the first virtual two player draft this weekend, perhaps that will reveal some more insights that the bot drafts on cubecobra just cannot provide.