Welcome to my cube!
When I first started building this, my main objective was to create a fun experience with as few cards as possible for eight people drafts. A pool of 360 cards is challenging and restricting. At the same time, I must say it is truly fun to work through these difficulties and persue a diverse and balanced meta. Having this in mind, I wanted to insert as many archetypes as I could, so this cube experience could be repeatable without being repetitive. Currently, it has 16 different planned archetypes. What I did to most guilds was to create an archetype revolved on a legendary creature, and a secondary one. I hope this list can be helpful and a good reference for other cubes.
If you want to copy this cube, make it your own and modify it as you please, be my guest! I just ask you to give me some feedback if you spend your time with my creation. I am constantly changing and updating this list, so any opinions and suggestions are more than welcome :)
Let's get the archetypes:
Azorius
ETB matters: Drafting creatures with strong enters the battlefield effects grants you tons of value while developing your board. Get some blink/flicker effects like Ephemerate and your resources will be game ending.
Orzhov
Control: One of the three control archetypes, I have given BW control the only monarch card of the cube with Knights of the Black Rose. Removals and creatures such as Sentinel of the Eternal Watch will do the trick.
Boros
Weenies: Small aggro decks are just amazing. Easy to build, hard to disrupt. Get as many bodies on the table as possible with Usher of the fallen and friends, then pump your army with Goblin Bushwhacker to bring the game to a quick end.
Selesnya
Pillowfort: Selesnya may not be commonly recognized as a control combination, but your opponents will see it as such. Getting together a cruel mix of walls, fogs, taxing and tap effects will be enough to paralyze any aggro deck. Of course, you should have problems facing sacrifice and control decks, since they don't care that much about your defenses, but those are less common here. Oh, and maybe its a good idea to have a wincon beyond enraging your opponent. Nemata, Grove Guardian and Aerial Responder are great roadblocks and finishers.
Dimir
Reanimator: Step 1: discard big dumb Ulamog's Crusher
Step 2: cast Exhume
Step 3: ?????
Step 4: profit
Bear in mind that discard outlets such as Chemister's Insight and grave filling cards like Undead Butler are very useful ways to get your threats to the yard. Self discarding creatures, like Striped Riverwinder are quite an asset too. Maybe your wincon can be your opponent's one though... I'm looking at you, Eldest Reborn and Extract from Darkness.
Izzet
Simic
Rakdos
Sacrifice: Get your creatures to the dump for profit. The more expandable, the best. Add some strong recursion effects, like Victimize to make the party complete.
Golgari
Gruul
Combos/Interactions
I prefered not to let many combos in this cube. Generally, they are a bit frustrating to play against and hard to assemble while drafting. I decided to leave only three combos/interactions that are either loopable or game-ending if fully executed.
First, we have Flicker. It may be useful as a wincon for any blue deck and is also a fun challenge while drafting.
In case you don't know how it works:
Also, Archaeomancer can soft lock your opponent with Familiar's Ruse.
Second, there is the interaction between Oketra's Monument and Kor Skyfisher. A lowered cost kor can bounce itself, leaving a warrior token at the process for only . Decks like Selesnya Pillowfort get this as a strong and hard-to-disrupt wincon.
At last, we have Squeaky-Jikki combo, which consists in bontrolling both Scurry Oak and Ivy Lane Danizen under your control for infinite squirrels and the biggest oak you will ever see.
I chose not to give much redundancy to those combos, so that they may not be easy to assemble.
Too powerful cards
Once in a while, I find some cards that besides being peasant legal, are just too strong. It would just not be fun to play some games that are purely decided by a single overwhelming card. This is not an extensive list, but here are some of the cards I let go due to their sheer power.
Hymn to Tourach
Sinkhole
Wasteland
Ghostly Prision
Sol Ring
Fireblast
Skullclamp
Propaganda
Deathreap Ritual
Loxodon Warhammer
I'm also considering a shift in BG towards a food theme. I think we've got enough payoffs coming with this edition to make it worth trying. Hope I can bring something out soon.