Art by Thomas M. BaxaHello Cube Lovers!
Well, the plan was to build this cube on stream, and boy did we! Unlike my previous project, the Slice of Cube, this one only took 4 hours to rough out a design shell!
Quick thanks to everyone who came by or sent thoughts to be incorporated. Community involvement DEFINITELY made this cube a lot better than it was going to be with just me designing it.
SO. What now? Well, we have to test - a lot! There's a custom draft set up in the Playtest tab, which will provide you with 3 properly seeded packs. If you care to go in blind, be my guest - but be warned, this is a weird cube. So below are some clarifications
Cube Design GoalsThe idea for this cube originated when I looked back through my old Pauper Cube. I’ve outgrown it (and haven’t kept it up), but there are some really amazing Pauper staples in there that I want to find a home for. At the same time, I’m very much over the manabase that Pauper, and even Peasant, offer. At first I considered upgrading to Peasant, then also adding Rare lands. Finally, I settled on the following design goals.
Rarity MattersCube packs will be assembled with the same rarity distribution as retail set packs. This is a common practice with Set Cubes, and I plan to use a similar distribution in this cube. Each pack will have 1 Rare or Mythic, 3 Uncommons, and 10 Commons.
One of the things I love about doing Prerelease events is opening 6 rares and having to decide how I can play as many of them as possible without utterly warping my deck beyond recognition. Unlike retails sets, however, I plan to only include Rare/Mythic cards that are worth building your deck around.
At the same time, every retail limited deck benefits from finding duplicate copies of good Commons. So we’ll be using the rarity distribution method typically used in Set Cubes. One copy of each Rare or Mythic; two copies of each Uncommon; three copies of each Common.
Each card will be considered at all of it’s previous rarities before inclusion. For example, Skullclamp has been printed both as an Uncommon and as a Mythic. So when we add a card like that, we will decide which rarity it is in this particular environment.
While I enjoy the rarity decisions that have to be made during a Prerelease (or a retail draft), there is one thing I hate about retail sets more than anything: Chaff. Bulk. Filler. The stuff that goes into a draft pack just to fill up space.
So of course, since this is a cube, the card selection will be different in a few ways, when compared to a retail draft set.
Mainly, I plan to use only the best cards from Magic’s long and winding history. That could mean a copy of the most recent standard-ruining card, and it almost definitely means 3 copies of Lightning Bolt.
To be more clear, I’m looking at much more than just rAw PoWEr lEveL!. In fact, that may be the least of my considerations. For me there are three key factors to a card being one of Magic’s All Stars
Cards that create decisions, or complicate decisions, especially those surrounding combat, or those having to do with sequencing and timing. I like complex play and complicated decision trees, and I think that brings out the best in magic.
Cards that are enjoyable to play, including those that give an “Achievement Unlocked” feeling, or those that create a deckbuilding challenge. Of course, fun is highly subjective, but hey, that’s why I’m asking for community participation!
Cards that are powerful. Of COURSE we all want to drop a Griselbrand and watch the light go out of our opponent’s eyes. And the earlier the better, right? While I’m interested in powerful cards, I typically like to cut back on the power of the enablers. You can have the Big G, but reanimate options will likely be limited to turn 3 or 4. Ramp will be an option, but not the kind of turbo ramp that lets you hard cast an Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
Honorable mention - to call it the “All Star Cube,” any card that is ubiquitous across multiple formats, or in a variety of cubes is likely to make the cut. Cards that cube owners don’t even debate slamming into their vintage, legacy, modern, or jank cubes.
Also worth noting that no matter how much we’d like to include nothing but bombs, and especially given the rarity plans laid out above, a certain amount of glue is inherently necessary. At some point you just need efficient removal, some decent draw/filtering, and a few fixing cards. Of course, it’s arguable that there are plenty of best-in-class or all star versions of these cards, too, and that’s what we’ll be looking to include.
Going back to rarity for a moment, here are some numbers worth noting. I’m aiming to have 30 packs available, so that there are enough for an 8-seat pod, with a few leftover. As noted above, each Rare and Mythic will be singleton. Uncommon cards will be included in duplicate, and Commons will be included in Triplicate.
This means
30 Rares/Mythics, single copies
90 total Uncommons, 45 uniques in duplicate
300 total Commons, 100 uniques in triplicate
If you're going to draft it, you should probably have a sense of what kind of nonsense is supported. First things first, I typically like to design archetypes from a 3-color perspective. I find this leads us towards broader, flexible archetypes.
Because of the rarity setup in this environment, it's truly the powerful Uncommons, and the density of Commons that will make almost every deck in this cube go brrrrrr. Picking up a Rare/Mythic, or an OG dual is great, and all, but just like in a retail draft - you have to draw it to win with it.
Bant
Bant loves Booties. Not the foot kind, the Big Butts kind! Bant is getting down with Defender shenanigans, and there's no lying about it.
Slow-Ass Control. We've added a few alternate Wincons in case you'd prefer a win that comes with "Achievement Unlocked!"
Grixis loves spells. While this is also a viable flavor for control, going UB or UBx lets you get off to the races with a more aggressive, midrange, or combo-y version of the spells deck
Ponza. Land Destruction. Being an asshole. Whatever you call it, Jund's got it. Don't forget to pick up some ramp, too!
With the recent release of ZNR, and thanks to a community suggestion, we're going with a Lands Matters theme in Naya.
Tokens.
While Jeskai can easily get into a spells deck, we've also included a really neat Artifacts theme in here. The main focus is Ensoul effects, but there are other ways to make artifacts work in your favor.
With Reanimate at Uncommon, what archetype could we possibly run other than, well, reanimate!
Like Esper, Mardu is mostly about aggression. The shared colors with Naya mean a token option is available, or you can angle more at Boros/RDW.
Temur was tricky, but we ended up with Power Matters, finding a number of ways to exploit cards with 4 or more power (oft referred to as ferocious)
I don't typically like real fetches outside of powered cubes because I tend to find that they warp draft picks around them. If you have surveil lands, shocks, triomes, and fetches in your non-powered cube suddenly fetchlands just become the only thing you start drafting out of a pack. When the mana is bad, but still consistent enough then you suddenly get a lot more tension "do I draft the fixing or the card that's good in my archetype" where a strong fetchland would make that choice trivial weaker fixing makes it a lot more easy to take the spell over the land.
Just something to think about, especially if you rock a landfall theme or have cards where shuffling matters in some way.