Wacky Draft

Introduction

Unfortunately, I lost all access to my saved bookmarks recently. In scouring the web to restore them I came across the Wacky Draft from the Community Cup 2012 and 2013.  This is a special draft format that creates a lot of fun and interesting experiences and decks. Unfortunately, I could not find a single website that listed a comprehensive list of all the different rules associated with it. I will try to do that here....but realize that many more exist and will be added in the future.

Rules

Wacky Draft is a very casual draft format that is best utilized with as many people as possible.  In this special format, each player drafts according to a unique set of prearranged stipulations chosen at random.  Each player then drafts as "normal" as long as they follow the guidelines laid out to them.  Due to the often hilarious nature of the drafting experience, Wacky Draft is best appreciated either in teams or with an audience so some amount of healthy debate and conversation arises from each pick.  If there is a tie between two or more cards that your stipulation would mandate that you pick, you may choose one among them.  If no cards in the pack apply to your particular stipulation, you may choose one among them.  The list of stipulations (which is in no way comprehensive) are as follows....

Stipulations

3 Packs, 3 Colors
     Before looking at your first pack, choose a color and then draft a card of that color. Must draft a card of that color if able for the rest of that pack. Repeat this process for each of the three packs (repeating a color is not allowed).

A Cube Has Six Sides
     Must choose a card from the first six positions in the pack.

Aim High
     You must draft the card with the highest converted mana cost among the cards in the pack.

Alphabet Soup
     Starting with A, must pick the cards that begin with each subsequent letter of the alphabet. If there are no cards in the pack of the appropriate letter, move to the next letter in the alphabet.

A-L You Need Or M-ZE!
     Your main deck and any deck you sideboard into can contain only basic lands and either cards whose name begins with a letter A through L or cards whose name begins with a letter M through Z. (You choose which, and can even change which when sideboarding.)


Backdraft
     Draft a deck for the opposing team's Backdrafter (two Backdraft stipulations will be handed out).

Bear Force One
     Must draft the card that fulfills the most of the following:
                   *Converted Mana Cost 2
                   * 2 Power
                   * 2 Toughness
                   * Green
                   * Creature

Big Butts
     You must draft a creature with higher toughness than power if able.

Big Guns
     Must draft the creature with the highest combination of power and toughness.

Border Patrol
     You must draft a card that uses the pre-Eigth Edition (retro) frame if able.

Dream Curve
     Must draft the nonland card with the lowest converted mana cost among the cards in the pack for your first pick. For each other pick, you must draft a card with converted mana cost 1 higher than the last card you drafted if able.  If there is not a card with the appropriate CMC, go up until there is one. If there is still no card, drop back down to the lowest CMC. The chain carries over into fresh packs.

End of the Rainbow
     You must draft a multicolored card or a permanent card that can produce multiple colors of mana if able. Lands that tap to search for mana sources of two different colors count.

Follow the Leader
     Each pick must share a color, converted mana cost, power or toughness with the previous pick if possible.

Gone Platinum
     Pick the card with the name that makes the best band name.

How Now, Brown Cow?
     Must draft a colorless nonland card or a land that doesn't tap for colored mana if possible. Lands that tap to search for colored mana sources do not count.

Izzet a Deck Yet?
     You must draft an instant or sorcery card or a card with "instant" or "sorcery" in its rules text if able.

King of the Fatties
     You must draft a creature with power 4 or greater if able.

Look Sharpe
     Must draft the card with the best-dressed creature in the artwork. Doesn't have to be a creature. If nothing "well dressed" then pick anything with clothes. If nothing with clothes, pick anything.

Lowest of the Low
     You must draft a spell with the lowest converted mana cost among cards in the pack.  Lands are not spells.

Come, Midget, And Use My Pillow As A Sleeping Bag
     Must draft the card with the fewest number of syllables in its card name.

Pauper 
     Must take a common or uncommon if able.

Read the Signals
     Must draft the card that shares the colors with the most other cards in the pack.

Roll for Damage
     Before each pick, roll a six-sided die. You must draft a card whose mana cost or card text includes the color matching the result if able.
          1. White
          2. Blue
          3. Black
          4. Red
          5. Green
          6. Your choice

Spellbound
     Your main deck and any deck you sideboard into must contain zero creature cards.

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
     Must draft the card that contains the most syllables in its name.

Trigger Happy
     You must draft a card with a triggered ability if able. Look for "When", "Whenever" and "At" statements if you are not sure what this means.

Up All Night to Get Loucksy
     Must take a land if available.

Worldknit
     Your main deck and any deck you sideboard into must contain every card that you drafted, but you may add any number of Vivid Lands and basic lands into your deck as well.

Cube Tweak

Introduction

Just a tweak on one of the changes made for the Theros update as well as a tweak in white. 

White

In                         Out

 

Bringing back Savannah Lions to bolster the one drops in white. I always thought there was a higher density of one drops in white in my cube but it turns out that a few of them are actually not super aggressive cards or get better with a larger mana input...cards like Mikaeus, the Lunarch and Mother of Runes. Because of this, I looked through for a two drop that is replaceable to bring back Savannah Lions and found one.

Kor Skyfisher is getting cut because it isn't nearly as aggressive or fast as it looks on paper. Its raw stats are really pushed but the drawback of returning a permanent to your hand usually pushes it out of truly aggressive decks and keeps it in more mid-range shenanigans decks that want to reuse cards with CITP effects.  Returning a land to your hand is a lot more detrimental than I thought it would be and returning a creature post attack is pretty depressing as well because if it dies it is a lot worse for you than if any other creature you control dies. 

Black

In                        Out

 

Dauthi Slayer comes back in as it was originally cut in favor of Tormented Hero. I still like the Hero and I think he is a solid addition.  However, I think there is a better cut than the Slayer which holds a lot of value in my playgroup and is played more heavily than Hand of Honor...which I will be cutting. Dauthi Slayer is a more efficient beater while simultaneously getting rid of a hate bear that was still kicking around. Hand of Cruelty blocks better but I don't think that's particularly important in that archetype and did I mention I hate hate bears in general?  I think this is a much better cut and that has been supported within my playgroup.

Conclusion

Not a lot of changes here but I think both of these are correct and show the value of looking at past picks with a new perspective. See you for Born of the Gods!  Until then...

Enjoy!

Theros Cube Update

Theros Cube Update

Introduction

Welcome to the Theros Cube Update! We have some good stuff here today and a whole lot of talk about cards that didn't make the cut. Theros is an interesting set for both constructed and limited but unfortunately the mechanics don't translate that well to an environment like the cube.  As much as I love the Bestow mechanic in Theros limited it's too expensive to be used reliably in cube. You would need to be able to cast the creature on its own most of the time and not be disappointed with it.  This severely limits the cards that are worthwhile.  The same problem is present with Heroic. Since it only triggers off of being targeted by spells and NOT abilities (thank god) it will almost NEVER trigger in cube. There just aren't enough auras and beneficial instants that target your own creatures and there probably won't ever be.  Because of that, again, the Heroic trigger needs to be seen as an upside that will probably not be relevant in 90% of games.  Either way, we still get a lot of cards to discuss and that's all I can ask for. So without further adieu, here we go!

White

In                       Out

 

Soldier of the Pantheon is another sweet one drop for aggressive decks with some awesome flavor text about gaining life. The protection from multicolored is not as irrelevant as it might seem since there are a lot of those kicking around.  Either way, this is a slam dunk for cube and white can always appreciate more cards like this.

Twilight Shepherd was a cool card that never really got played more than once or twice.  When it did, it did some cool things but between the mana cost and the improvement of white finishers, I think white needs the extra one drop more. This was pretty clearly the weakest creature that high in the curve so this was a good opportunity to lower it a bit.

In                        Out

 

Spear of Heliod is another anthem effect for white which are always played heavily in both aggro and token strategies.  The upside of pumping all of your creatures (not just white ones) and the destruction ability outweigh the ability of other decks to destroy it via artifact removal.

Divine Sacrament was hurt a lot by the ability to only pump your white creatures.  This wasn't always a problem back when mono white and mono red were the primary aggro strategies.  Nowadays however, two color aggro is quite common and only pumping half of your creatures isn't good enough especially when the threshold ability didn't come up as often as I thought it might originally.

Didn't Make the Cut

 

As I have stated before, I am limiting planeswalkers to three per main color and one per color pair.  That means that the only things standing in the way of Elpeth, Sun's Champion of entering the cube are Ajani Goldmane, Elspeth, Knight-Errant and Gideon Jura. Ajani is a staple in aggressive, mid-range and token strategies in white while nothing on earth is getting rid of Elspeth 1.0 or Gideon marring another completely bonkers broken planeswalker.  Unfortuantely for the new Elspeth, six mana is a lot.  Her ability to drop three tokens every turn is ludicrious but her other two abilities might as well not even get played.  I have come to really dislike planeswalkers that do literally nothing other than drop a token every turn as there is no strategy or interaction and they all play the exact same way, going in every deck that plays that color. At this point I need interesting or fun planeswalkers or I just am not interested.  Sorry lady, maybe next time.

I am going to look at all of the Gods the same way.  I think that in order to properly gauge their usefulness in cube I need to assume they will never become creatures.  Getting devotion 5 is not impossible but isn't very likely to show up a lot of the time either, especially since a single removal spell can turn these Gods back into enchantments instantly.  That means that unless their static enchantment abilities are good enough to warrant inclusion by themselves, they won't make the cut regardless of what their creature stats are.  Vigilance is almost worthless in white weenie where you don't want to block anyway.  The ability to make tokens is quite good but I don't feel that it is quite enough since making one token is so mana intensive.  Note that the tokens do not count towards the devotion.  If they did, this could very well be good enough. C'est la vie.

Blue

In                         Out

 

Vaporkin is nice upgrade to the blue aggro package as an evasive threat with a less severe drawback than Thought Eater.  Reducing the max hand size scared some players away from playing it and it only worked in the most aggressive blue decks.  Otherwise, this is a pretty parallel switch.

Didn't Make the Cut

 

Again, assuming Thassa will never be a creature (even more true in blue than in other colors) you are going to be relying on scry 1 every turn and the ability to make your creatures unblockable. Neither of these effects are actually worth a full card in cube and I don't think that stapling them together is going to do much better. Most blue threats already have evasion which makes Thassa only really good for your secondary color which makes this pretty much a gold card. Scry 1 is only good late game when you know exactly what you want and don't want.  This card may cost three but in order to make the most of it you need threats already present on the board and excess mana.  Neither of these things are going to happen until much later in the game which mitigates the inexpensive mana cost.  If you could make this a creature by turn four consistently it would be good enough but I just don't see that happening.

Thassa's Bident suffers from a similar problem in that it's only good if you are ahead. Forcing opposing creatures to attack is useless unless you are beating them down at a higher clip or eating their guys in combat...neither thing something that blue is very adept at doing by itself.  Also, keep in mind that forcing your opponent's creatures to attack does not mean your creatures are unblockable. If they play a single creature, it won't attack due to summoning sickness and that could hold back your team as well. This would be better in a color like green that really needs the card advantage...blue has enough ways to draw cards that I don't think this fills a needed role.

Black

In                         Out

 

Marsh Flitter is a pretty sweet card that I was reminded about when Modern Masters came out and I thought it would be a perfect addition to the cube as an easier to cast threat that gave you some residual effects even if it was killed.  It has a great CITP effect that gets better with blinks or reanimation as well as keeping you alive if you aren't aggressive. I like it.

Howling Banshee isn't bad but it isn't really exciting either.  It was in here when I started the cube and I have finally found something to push it out. I don't think it ever actually got played so I can't imagine anyone will miss it much.

In                        Out

 

I am not sure if the larger cube community feels the same way about Mogis's Marauder or not but I think this card is the stone nuts in black aggro.  Not only does it make your team pretty much unblockable but it itself has haste.  Also, it triggers when it enters the battlefield not when you cast it so blinking shenanigans work very well here as well.  While this is much better in a heavy black deck, black has so many double mana costs that the devotion really shines, turning some of the negative about black into a positive. 

Undead Gladiator is just so god awful slow that I found myself just never putting it in my maindeck even if I was black and had a graveyard strategy. 

In                          Out

 

Tormented Hero is yet another (and not the last) powerful one drop in Theros with some flavor text about gaining and losing life.  Seriously, I don't expect this Heroic ability to ever trigger and it doesn't even matter. Coming into play tapped is a drawback but not a serious one as you don't actually want to be blocking with this anyway.  Black aggro needed some help so I am excited to see it getting it in this update.

I realize it might seem counter-intuitive to boost black aggro by removing a card whose only purpose is attacking with evasion but I have found that it just isn't that good.  Unless you are handing it equipment, the double black mana cost means that it's too hard to drop on turn two consistently since the black aggressive decks are never mono colored.  I already made changes to limit the amount of double white two drops in white and it has really helped that color a lot.  I look forward to similar results as more cards get released in black as well.

In                         Out

 

Hero's Downfall fills a very important role in black in that it gives black an answer to planeswalkers. Suddenly the color that has the hardest time dealing with them has the best answer.  This is a huge deal.  While this will kill a creature most of the time, the flexibility means that this will get drafted highly and played in maindecks more often than not even over cheaper removal options.

The split second of Sudden Death really never became important and as creatures got better, -4/-4 wasn't the guaranteed creature kill it once was.  I like Hero's Downfall as a pretty strong upgrade over a similar card.

Didn't Make the Cut

 

Erebos might actually be the weakest of the gods in cube where the gain life clause is mostly irrelevant and the card draw ability is too expensive both in life to use and mana.  Unless you are gaining life at a good clip you aren't going to want to use it very much at all, especially against aggressive decks.

Giving your creatures lifelink has a much larger application in regular limited as opposed to cube.  The reanimation clause is way too expensive and interacts negatively with the reanimation suite currently alive in black which supports repeated recursion over one time efforts.

Didn't Make the Cut

I actually really like Read the Bones and I think it's a lot closer to inclusion than some people think.  Drawing two cards for two life is the standard that black has in cube but the ability to Scry prior to drawing increases the probability that the cards will be helpful dramatically.  If I am paying life for cards I really want them to not be blanks.  That said, three mana for two cards isn't really cube worthy, even if you factor in the Scry bonus...so close though. 

Red

In                        Out

 

Firedrinker Satyr is a strict upgrade over Jackal Pup here.  Some people get scare by the amount of damage you could potentially take by playing cards like this but the second ability is gravy that you don't actually have to use if you don't want to or can't afford to.  

Red needs all the one drops it can get and I know people have been outspoken about not making the easy changes in cube and actually looking for the correct card to cut but I really think this is correct.  Jackal Pup lost a lot of excitement in recent years as creatures have gotten better.  The damage ability was not irrelevant despite how aggressive those decks are and I would rather not have multiple one drops with the same drawback.

In                        Out

 

Purphoros is the only god to make it into the cube (spoilers). This is because he is the only one whose non-creature ability has a big enough effect.  To be honest, I will play this as an enchantment not even caring if the creature ever becomes relevant and I think that's what is important.  Dealing damage whenever a creature comes into play is massive.  This makes all of your late turn one drops Shocks to the dome. In decks where you only ever struggle to deal the last 5 points of damage or so this is a lot of reach.  The firebreathing ability is a little expensive but not irrelevant as it, again, makes your late game dudes a little more scary and gives you something to do with excess mana.  Note that this hits all of your creatures not just one.

Shivan Wumpus was actually played quite a bit but the problem was that it was only effective about half the time.  Even in those scenarios, half of that was because it was a land destruction spell and the other half was because it was a creature.  Giving your opponent the choice meant that they would just do what hurt them less and the only time it really shined was when they were land screwed and didn't have a removal spell.  It's just not that exciting or aggressive.

In                        Out

 

Goblin Bombardment is an experiment for me.  There are a lot of decks that this will shine in especially seeing all of the Threaten effects in red and the token subtheme in white.  This is going to be a really nice finishing blow for a lot of decks and has a lot of synergy that looks fun.

Pandemonium was used a couple of times but never really fit in any decks other than Rick's epic..."Do nothing until I play Pandemonium followed by Saproling Burst and win" deck...which got there all of one time I think.  I think Goblin Bombardment is going to do a lot better.

In                       Out

 

Stormbreath Dragon gives red another hastey flying creature that will randomly wreck someone's face if you have a lot of mana lying around.  I don't expect the Monstrosity ability to be relevant most of the time but it's a nice bonus.  Either way, the pro white is nice because otherwise it would get chumped by spirit tokens all day long.  It also dodges quite a bit of removal because of its protection. I like it.

Kazuul is another card that supports more defensive red decks but those have been on their way out for a while now. Usually what happens when you cast this is that people either kill it, stop attacking you until they kill it or just attack you with fliers. Either way, because of the ability you don't want to trade this guy in combat so he doesn't attack as often as it seems he would. I like the Dragon better.

In                    Out

 

Lightning Strike deals an efficient 3 damage for two mana. 

Flame Javelin deals a less efficient 4 damage for six, five, four or three mana. I like Flame Javelin but it really only goes in a mono red deck and Lightning Strike is more flexible.  The loss of 1 damage shouldn't make that much of a difference.

Didn't Make the Cut

 

Ember Swallower will go really well in a lot of cubes that support Wildfire strategies but as I have said before I do not have the artifact mana required to make those strategies viable.  Because of that, you are looking at a vanilla creature that gets bigger and while it really is huge, I don't think it's all together that interesting beyond that.

Hammer of Purphoros has a very powerful effect in giving your creatures haste and making a 3/3 with haste every turn is quite good as well.  The problem is that red's noncreature spells are pretty tight and I don't know how many times a game you will reliably be able to use the second ability...I would guess on average twice.  Unfortunately, this isn't really an aggro card but more of a boon to mid-range and up red decks and there aren't a whole lot of them going on.

Green

In                        Out

 

Giving all of your creatures deathtouch is very annoying with any of your late game mana guys as well as token strategies which green fits well in already.  The abilites on the bow are a nice, inexpensive mana sink that will always be relevant. Gaining 3 life will be appreciated against aggressive strategies while the +1/+1 counter is always good. The other two are more narrow but the flexibility is intersting and while I don't think this is a powerhouse I do think it will be a nice role player.

Abundance was seriously played every single time it was drafted it seems like. The problem is that it didn't every actually do anything.  The ability to control your draw step is a powerful one but as this doesn't actually draw you cards, just provides selection, it just doesn't do enough.  Sure, late game you can pitch lands and if you need an extra mana to cast a fatty you can guarantee yourself that but a lot of times when someone played this I was just happy they took a turn off from doing anything so I could either put on more pressure or stabalize as a control deck.

In                        Out

 

Sylvan Caryatid does a lot of things and all of them well.  It fixes your mana and ramps you while simultaneously cutting off aggressive creatures which is really important for a ramp deck.  It also survives all non-wrath, non-edict removal.  The key to this is hexproof.  The reasons I dislike hexproof in general are mitigated here by this not actually dealing killing blows.  This is a fantastic ramp card that does so much.

Farseek is the weakest of the ramp options in a vaccum since it can't get a Forest which sometimes is really important!  The ability to get a shock land doesn't really come up that often due to the size of my cube and the non-inclusion of the original dual lands which this could also fetch up.  The important thing here is that I am not reducing the amount of ramp in green as I think we are finally to the correct saturation point and I want to keep it that way.

Didn't Make the Cut

 

Boon Satyr is going to be totally sick in standard but the 2 toughness leaves it wanting a lot more in cube since it will trade with whatever you are blocking. You are almost never going to ambush anything and live to tell the tale and while the Bestow cost is very reasonable you just aren't getting that much for it. If this was a 4/3 I would be all over it because there are a lot of 2 toughness utility guys running around that attack every now and then but I much prefer cards like Wolfir Avenger to this since it survives a tussle.

The vanilla stats on this guy are a lot less impressive in cube than in standard. Both Deadbridge Goliath and Blastoderm have been in the cube and the best thing about them is their secondary abilities. I am not in the market for big vanilla guys in cube no matter what their cost since it's not interesting.  Is Polukranos's ability good enough?  I don't think it is to be honest. It is so incredibly mana intensive in order to activate and it really doesn't deal that much damage.  At best you are picking off two utility creatures at the cost of 9 mana? I think we are doing better with what we currently have thank you very much.

Didn't Make the Cut

Giving your creatures trample is almost irrelevant in cube as is a very expensive pump that you are hardly ever going to use.  Sure, it makes your creatures a headache to deal with in combat but I don't think that is worth a card even in a color whose noncreature spells are the weakest in cube.  Just not very impressed.

Azorius

Didn't Make the Cut

This card is just not very good. There, I said it. There are a lot of 2/x creatures that can block this guy and his effect when he hits just isn't very good. It's too swingy. Getting a land off your opponents deck just isn't very great and the life gain is nice but nothing special. He also dies to every removal spell in cube and doesn't block at all. Meh.

Boros

In                        Out

 

Figure of Destiny used to be in the cube but was cut for being too mana intensive. As it turns out I think it would be an awesome addition to either red or white and insane in both.  It's probably one of the best one drops in the cube and now after I expanded the amount of cards per guild I forgot about it until now. 

Slayers' Stronghold was pretty good when it got played but the competition in Boros is absolutely ludicrious now. I want to get Figure back into the cube and this was the weakest card remaining.

Didn't Make the Cut

  

Anax and Cymede would be amazing in cube if only Heroic was possible to trigger. Yep, that's it. All I had to say about that.

So if you remember my philosophy about gold cards in my cube it's that they must do one of several things.  They have to be interesting or unique, super fun, or provide something that the color combination really needs and doesn't otherwise have enough access to. Both red and white have plenty of removal of this variety and that's all this card does, creature removal. Boros is too deep to be playing around with cards like this. It's why Terminate was removed from Rakdos a while ago and I haven't regretted it once. Same thing here.

Dimir

In                         Out

 

Ashiok looks very interesting. Firstly, she is strictly a control card and is only good after you have played some defense first.  That said, she is a cheap follow up to a wrath effect that secretly does protect itself.  Casting your opponents creatures from exile for free is quite strong since you don't have to input any mana into her after her initial casting cost. She is also a win condition on her own if they can't actually deal with her as she will mill them out or kill them with their own creatures. Her ultimate is pretty inconsequential except when playing reanimator or control, where it is quite strong against both.  I want to give her a try, she looks intersting at least.

Havengul Lich never got off the ground and started running.  The activated ability clause is super irrelevant as I expected but what I didn't expect was that nobody really ever played it. It's not bad, but it's certainly the weakest of Dimir's options and I wanted to try out Ashiok anyway. If she turns out to be meh I can see this going back in.

Gruul

Didn't Make the Cut

Xenagos not making the cut is completely due to the actual effectiveness of the other Gruul planeswalker, Domri Rade, who turned out to be quite good. I only want one planeswalker per guild so that leaves me with the choice between the two. Personally, I like Domri more, especially since the first ability here is kind of win-more since it's only as good as your board presence. Yes, the second ability is bonkers but I still think Domri is a more proven commodity that provides the color combination with something it doesn't really have much of....card advantage. 

Izzet

In                        Out

 

Steam Augury is an awesome card that is going to be a hit both in fun and effectiveness. Fact or Fiction is incredibly good and this shouldn't be too much worse even though the opponent chooses which pile goes where. The same mind games get to be played just in a little different way. This time, the skill comes in the pile making as well as the card selection. 

Dominus of Fealty costs approximately 1 billion American red or blue mana symbols. Even though it furthers the subtheme of stealing your opponent's permanents it's way too mana intensive to be cast reliably and I don't feel bad about cutting it.

Orzhov

In                       Out

 

Ashen Rider is a sweet upgrade over Angel of Despair here. It is basically the same card instead that it exiles as opposed to destroying (huge) and it does it upon coming into play AND dying (huge). I guess it also costs one colorless mana more (not so huge).  Seeing as how this is a sweet reanimation target anyway, I love this upgrade.

Selesnya

Didn't Make the Cut

It's pretty crazy when a strictly upgraded Watchwolf doesn't make it into cube but I think that's where we are in Selesnya. The competition is insane and I don't feel comfortable cutting any of the other options at this time. This definitely gets put on the list of cards to take a closer look at when I am able to identify the weakest link in Selesnya but I don't think I can do that yet. This is good enough I just need to figure out if it's actually better than the other options too.  Check back in next update and see if I made a decision about this yet.

Conclusion

Who knew that in the Theros upgrade I would secretly also get to upgrade the gold cards as well?!  I for one was really happy with Theros as a set as it gave me a lot of cards to talk about as well as some really interesting ones that I can't wait to get a chance to play with.  Next up is Born of the Gods in 2014...until then...

Enjoy!