4/26/10

Trying out some stuff:

Birds of Paradise in for Heartwood Storyteller

Terastodon in for Wolfbriar Elemental

Grafted Wargear in for Platinum Angel

:( :(

Sulfuric Vortex in for Rakka Mar

Zo-Zu in for Beacon of Destruction

Smash to Smithereens in for Shattering Pulse

Trying out a bunch of stuff that people seem to like. Smash seems like the Searing Blaze of Shatters. Rakka Mar hasn't really done enough. Wolfbriar is rad but we've had two drafts now where the person playing green had him, but wasn't green enough to play him as anything but a 4/4.

4/24/10 Changes

Wall of Omens in for Hyena Umbra

Sorry, little Umbra buddy. No way you were making the cut.

Crater Hellion in for Caldera Hellion

Trying this out. The sac outlet is interesting, but oh well.

Snake Umbra showed up yesterday and seems ok enough. We'll see- I really want the umbras to show up in a draft with Troll Ascetic or Uril, for maximum dreamy effect.

04/20/10 Changes

Trying out a bunch of stuff to see what sticks. I'm sure some of these aren't right, but we wanted to give a bunch of things we've been curious about a shot.

Heartwood Storyteller in for Reclaim

I haven't been too hyped up on Reclaim, and we wanted to get more card draw into green. We'll see how it goes.


Boar Umbra in for Hunting Pack

Snake Umbra in for Saproling Burst

We wanted to get a few more auras into the cube. I imagine that whatever doesn't work out will be replaced with Hunting Pack, but we'll see.

Land Tax in for Glorious Anthem

Hyena Umbra in for Pianna, Nomad Captain

Transcendent Master in for Soltari Champion

Knight of the White Orchid in for Otherworldly Journey

Oh god I'm so sad about that.

but I'm really happy about this:

Razormane Masticore in for Dolmen Gate

The Crusher might not be right- we'll see- but at least the Masticore is back!


We just made a bunch of changes to white, so I'll address this here: I agree that our cube doesn't support aggro, and I think that's ok. Actually I think that is normal for a limited format. I know a lot of people really want aggressive red/white decks to be draftable in their cube. For me, it's ok if the most aggressive deck still has 4 and 5 drops, which is how our cube works in practice.

4/19/10 Changes

I'll write more about this later, but for now:

Gilded Drake in for Chronozoa

Wolfbriar Elemental in for Rhox

Sylvan Library in for Kamahl, Fist of Krosa

Careful Consideration in for Brine Elemental

04/19 Draft 2

This is probably the sickest cube deck in recent memory. I'm embarrassed to show you mine, by comparison.

Justin's deck:



Needless to say I was never in any of the games we played.

Mine:

Rise of the Eldrazi Changes - Final

Student of Warfare in for Akrasan Squire

Linvala, Keeper of Silence in for Galepowder Mage

Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief in for Dark Hatchling

Kargan Dragonlord in for Taurean Mauler

Flame Slash in for Fork

Momentous Fall in for Gaea's Anthem

Vengevine in for River Boa

All is Dust in for Triskelavus

Ulamog's Crusher in for Razormane Masticore

Just trying this out... the masticores don't see enough play to justify having both in.

Google Docs Version

Here as web page and here as a doc

Rise of the Eldrazi Changes

So far, here's what I'm thinking:

Student of Warfare in for Akrasan Squire

Super excited, don't feel like there is much to go wrong here.

Linvala in for Galepowder Mage

One of those cards that worked better in theory. Linvala seems super powerful and a decent body regardless.

All is Dust in for Triskelavus

( I guess it is the colorless section now)

Sorry, buddy. Rules changes were no good at all for you.

Momentous Fall in for Gaea's Anthem

Seems too rad to not include, right?

4/5/10 Draft

Ok, so my notes aren't super detailed for this draft, but let's just note- our decks are both awesome and with one exception, every game was totally interesting and fun.

Justin ending up winning, basically with one card each time- Kodama, then Overrun, then Stonewood Invocation. Man, I assume you love Stonewood Invocation too. Right?

The last game was crazy. I decree of pained for 15 cards, nearly decked myself, but I had Platinum Angel to make sure I could still live. Then I turned into an insane person and decided to wait a turn before playing the angel, and a sprout swarm token invocationed right into my face for lethal. Still! Really exciting and I got to live all of my dreams: Bloodghast & Attrition, Urza's Factory and Attrition, Platinum Angel and almost losing, Platinum Angel and Pact, Stuffy Doll and drawing Stuffy Doll every game.

Justin had probably the raddest sideboard in the history of the cube- vedalken shackles for stuffy doll. I'm still charmed by that.

Platinum Angel gets a lot of shit but she really held it down in this series. I think she will still get replaced by All is Dust, but now it will be a bittersweet type of replacement.

My deck:



Justin's:

4/5/10 Changes

Undermine in for Wydwen, the Gale that Bites

(that's Justin's remark <3 <3 <3)

Worldwake Manlands in for M10 Duals

These have been AWESOME so far. Sorry I ever doubted you, Lava Horse.

4/4 Draft

I lost this one - we went to game 5 - through the awesome decision to NOT include a black source in my deck game 1. I found that out when I went to fetch a land in preparation for my Mana Drain-fueled turn 5 Thrax. Le sigh.

Here's me:



And JT:



I believe Justin directly won two games with Mindslaver. Yay Mindslaver!

3/22/10 Draft 2

I'm almost positive Justin won this one.

Look at his deck- doesn't it look rad:



I remember Dominus being the MVP, and Obsidian Fireheart is a ridiculous badass.


Mine:

03/22/10 Draft One

Ok, I'm trying something new here. After our draft last night, Justin and I took some pictures of our decks and made some notes about them. I'm hoping this is entertaining, but it would also be cool to eventually do some data mining... I'm not sure exactly what. If you have any thoughts about what would be interesting or useful to keep track of, let me know!


Here is Justin's deck:




and here is the decklist (minus basic lands, which I'll try to write down in the future)

and here is mine:



and here is the decklist

I won the series, largely of the back of Library. I think the series went to game 5, but my deck definitely performed exceptionally well- I had Reveillark shenanigans, aether vial-into-mirri, and recurring Nekrataals all over.

Mock Interview:

What was your first pick?
J: Day of Judgement. I started in blue as well, but moved into green when that dried up. Call of the Herd was the first green card I took intentionally (Note: we do a "Let's Make a Deal" draft. Basically, you put one card in three piles, then the person who goes first looks at the first card. They can either take it, or add one card from the stack to the pile and move to the next pile. If you don't like any cards you see, you take one off the top. I like this format a lot because you get signals and have the ability to hate out something you just can't deal with, but there is an element of luck as well.)
T: Bane of the Living. I got Laquatus's Champ soon after, and then Baneslayer to put me in white.

What were your MVPs?
J: Time Walk and Austere. Austere won a game where I had tokens and Thea was at 3 with a bunch of huge blockers.
T: Library! Also Ob Nixilis was rad. I think I Necromancy-ed for Laquatus to win once. Yay Necromancy!

What is the one card you wish you had had in your deck?
J: Library.
T: Divinity of Pride, of course.

A Shinier Multicolor

If I could I would put every full art card in the cube.

2/23/10 Draft

I had a very "whatever I need, when I need it" couple of games with this deck- I won the series but it probably wasn't that representative of what should have happened. Aether Vial is pretty much the best ever though. This was a debut for Thunderblust and he was awesome. Oh, I also had LD on turn 4 every game. Yikes.

My deck:



Justin's:

2/22 Draft 2

Yuckers. This is one of the worst decks I've drafted in the cube:



And Justin decided to prove why mono-red-hybrid is the raddest:



I don't like to say blowout, but there we are.

2/22 Draft 1

How many times will Nemesis of Reason destroy me? Enough. Library doesn't hurt either.


My deck:



And Justin's:

2/19 Draft

Alright, so turns out a month and a half later all I remember is whose decks were whose. SPOILER ALERT: This deck is jerkier than the other one so it was probably mine. I think I one this series, although it is by no means obvious since Justin's deck is also rad.

Here's mine:



And here is Justin's:



If I'm remembering correctly, the deal was that Sarkhan never ever showed up for Justin. Has anyone else tried the Persecutor in the cube? Thoughts? I'm sold on it, but I think I might be the only one.

2/16/09 Changes

Alright, so we laid out each color today to talk about the curve we wanted, and decided on a few changes as a result.

First, the changes:

Kor Skyfisher in for Kor Aeronaut

This effect is just never not good. The definition of a not-drawback.

Journey to Nowhere in for Scepter of Dominance

The scepter is really good, but the commitment to white is pretty high, and white has a lot of other cards that are more powerful with a strong color requirement such as Sacred Mesa and Eight-and-a-half-Tails

Bloodghast in for Malakir Bloodwitch

Conservation of vamp.... nevermind. We really wanted Bloodghast in and the curve for black seemed high enough.


Necromancy in for Makeshift Mannequin.

Seems better, right?

Searing Blaze in for Carbonize

Seems nice.

Thunderblust in for Changeling Berserker

Trying it out. Kazuul is another option here, but I'm not sure that's what red wants. Red doesn't have a lot of high end creatures though.

Rampaging Baloths in for Baru, Fist of Krosa

Again, green doesn't have a lot of huge monsters. Hey look! A monster.

So, now for the stats.

	Creatures	Spells	Avg Creature CMC	Average Spell CMC
White	35	25	3.7	3.6
Blue	31	29	4.3	3.0
Black	30	30	4.0	2.8
Red	35	25	4.1	2.3
Green	40	20	3.9	3.0

Bloodhall Ooze = Optogenetics

Or is a neuron. Either way, the resemblance is pretty stunning.