Art by Zoltan BorosWelcome! The Kitchen Table Cube was designed to provide an engaging playing and drafting format for experienced players, while simultaniously catching some of what makes magic the gathering feel magic to me.
The cube provides a range of micro archetypes which can be drafted but is heavily leaning towards the fair side of the spectrum and rewards synergistic archetypes more than combo oriented deck building.
The cubes philosophy and card pool is heavily inspired by the great Dekkaru Cube by Glen Dekker as well as the recent iterations of the Arena cube, but tries to slightly reduce power to make some space for some inclusion which cater to the Timmies in us.
Macro ArchetypesAlthough I love nothing more than scrying, my Kitchen Table Cube has been designed with the holy trinity in mind. Aggro beats Control, beats Midrange, beats Aggro. This tension, to me, is one of the core aspects of the game, so making it part of the drafting experience was very important to me.
Aggro
Turning creature sideways and smacking your opponent (metaphorically) in the face is not very elegant, but still a great way of winning a game of magic. Aggro is supported in all colors but blue and uses a wide range of resilient, disruptive but most of all, efficient threats to end games early. Midrange
Value Town, the save haven of the undecisive. Although often frowned upon, midrange decks are extremly rewarding to pilot, because playing good cards is just a lot of fun. If you like to ask yourself the question of "Who is the beatdown?" draft midrange! Variations of this archetype are available in all colors. Sometimes simultaniously. Control
Somebody at the table has to be the bad guy. They are typically recognizable by their untapped islands on the other players turn. Blue is the core of most viable control strategies in this cube. Cantrips, permission and some sort of win condition and you have drafted yourself a great control deck. Variations of this archetype are viable in every blue based color pair. Micro Archetypes
Below is an incomplete list of key payoffs or enablers for some of the specific micro archetypes supported in this cube. May they help you in drafting the cube.
Reanimator