Introduction This cube is a work in progress!!! We have decided to share our idea with MTGS in not only an attempt to further improve our cube, but to grow what we feel is a unique and fun idea. Our card decisions are directly based on what we feel are important staples in the EDH format. We are open to any and all suggestions. However, please understand that there are many unorthodox card decisions within this cube, as well as a higher mana curve than normal. These aspects are directly related to the cube being geared toward EDH and EDH only. So before we are vilified for not including Lightning Bolt, please keep this in mind. Additionally, for more cube goodness, please see the link in my signature to Theogony IX's traditional 360 cube, one he has maintained and improved for over two years now.
Cube:
51 Generals
76 of Each Color
100 Gold/Multi-Colored
96 Colorless
67 cards deck (66 card deck, plus 1 general)
40 life
21 lethal general damage
1 - 4 Players Sealed: 144 card sealed pool, 8 random generals
4 - 6 Players Draft: 72 card draft pool, 9 packs of 8 cards, 1 draft pack of 5 generals
7 - 8 Players Draft: 72 card draft pool, 6 packs of 12 cards, 1 draft pack of 4 generals
Each player will draft a pool of generals first, followed by a more traditional drafting of a 67 card deck. Each players' general pool will, theoretically, drive their decisions when drafting their decks. There are, technically, two cubes. The 32 card General cube, and a more traditional 576 card cube.
Running a simulated draft or sealed pool on cubetutor:
1. Open a link to the Generals Pool and click on the sealed tab. Open a single sealed back of between 5 and 9 cards. These will be the generals you start your draft will.
2. Open a link to the Draft Pool and click on the draft tab.
3a. If you want to simulate a draft of 7-8 players, set the packs to be 12 cards each, 6 packs in total, and 6-7 bots.
3b. If you want to simulate a draft of 5-6 players, set the packs to be 9 cards each, 8 packs in total, and 4-5 bots.
3c. If you want to simulate a draft of 3-4 players, set the packs to be 8 cards each, 9 packs in total, and 2-3 bots.
3d. If you want to make a sealed pool, open 12 packs of 12 cards each.
4. Build your deck to contain 66 cards. The 67th card will be your general. We have found that decks should include between 28 and 30 lands. This leaves 36 to 38 spell slots.
5. Enjoy your simulated cubing experience.
Conclusion: Like all cubes, much of the game is centered around combat. However, the politics of the game warp combat in many ways, making non-creature spells the more vital tools in a player's deck.
Conclusion: Red is our least mana intensive color - fixing can be less of a priority. Blue and black are the most mana intensive colors - fixing should be a high priority.
Conclusion: The peak of the curve plateau's across converted mana cost 3, 4 and 5. Between turn 4 and turn 5 is when games start to really move. If by the end of turn 6 you have not been able to start moving your game plan along, you will fall behind and be at an extreme disadvantage without a board reset or some way to accelerate your position.
New changes reflected in post #1. We lowered the total count of multicolored spells, taking one spell away from each guild and adding one spell to each color, and five to colorless. We felt the multicolor count was a bit too high, especially in drafts in which you'll be limited to specific colors depending on your drafted generals.
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Like we discussed, I'm not happy with Numot either. Why don't we give Zedruu the Greathearted a shot and see how he performs. He's super political which might lend games some interesting interplay, but the fact that he replaces in your hand each card he gives away, not once, but every turn, makes him a card advantage machine. He might be pretty good.
I'm not sure if the effect Zedruu brings for a RWU deck is that much better than Numot's, depending on the deck around either.
Hell, let's just R&D our own RWU general.
Lol, if all else fails, I'm down. Numot is boring though, and Zedruu might be better than we think. I really think we should give him a shot. I think he brings more to the table than Numot does, even if he isn't the most spikey intuitive general. He abuses the political game rather than the card game which is really interesting and provides more depth. Besides, Numot has almost zero support in rwu for what he does (3-4 cards), while Zedruu can abuse propaganda/prison, red's fork effects to destroy other's stuff but give them things to maintain the alliance; negate the political downside to blue's counter magic; give away white's static enchantments where it doesn't matter who controls them; mass distribute white's tokens at the end of your opponents' turns to draw a ton of cards; Homeward Path. I don't know man, the more I think about him the more I think he'll be really good, and fun to build around.
Edit: I really just want to the opportunity to say to someone, "Why are you mad at me over your hard cast Akroma being a 1/1, do nothing, ground beater? He's the one with Humility," and then point to the guy playing Momir as his general.
Large bulk of changes reflected in post #1. Only general change was Numot for Zedruu. We're very comfortable with our generals after this. Numot was the only weak link general, and Zedruu was the only option. We will see how it plays out.
The rest of the changes reflect a decision to respect the rules of commander a bit more. We've removed things like Recurring Nightmare, Tinker, Gifts Ungiven, and Balance - cards that are and have been banned in most EDH circles for a long time. We have also attempted to include more EDH staples (Splinter Twin, Eternal Dominion, etc.) as well as political and multiplayer centric spells (Archangel of Strife, Browbeat, etc.).
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I don't have any analysis yet, but I wanted to say that I like the concept. I've been a bit burnt out on regular EDH, so this might be the thing that resparks my interest.
I like the concept overall, not sure about the 40 life while using a 60 card deck. Also your general section says 30 generals and has 35 listed. Are you planning on playing 1 v 1 edh or multiplayer EDH with this cube?
I've had some time to think it over and here are a couple of things:
1. Shouldn't the Phyrexian Mana cards be included with their color? I get that they are essentially colorless for actual casting purposes, but unless you ignore the color identity rule for deck construction only certain decks can use them.
2. Any thoughts on using any of the artifact land fixers like Traveler's Amulet, Wanderers's Twig, or Armillary Sphere? I think they're underrated, especially in non-green decks - Sphere in particular is great for giving certain colors access to hitting all their land drops and card advantage. Similarly, no Evolving Wilds or Terramorphic Expanse?
3. Even if you leave out all the stuff from above, Expedition Map is a great EDH staple that seems to be missing from your list.
Good point on the phyrexian mana costs and color identity rules. We will look into making some adjustments.
As far as artifacts like Expedition Map go, we will look to make some cuts. The colorless section already feels very tight, but I'm sure there is wiggle room. We tried to include all the essential mana rocks, as well.
@Rathkeaux
The subject of 40 life games, 60 card decks, and the possibility of decking yourself has come up quite a bit in discussion. We are definitely open to changing this "rule" because this is essentially a virgin format. Our justification is that going from a constructed format like standard (60 cards) to a limited format (40 cards) sees a 33.3% drop in deck size while still retaining the regular 20 life total. EDH constructed sees 100 card decks. A 33.3% drop would be 66 card decks. We figured 60 was a nice round number everyone was already familiar with. The more we play the cube the better we will be able to gauge whether or not we should adjust the deck size limit.
The cube is designed to support both multiplayer and 1v1 EDH.
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Yeah, Rathkeaux, there are a few formatting errors in the op that we need to correct, they will undoubtedly be corrected over time as we fiddle with the list, but thank you for that one. I'm not sure we would have caught that any time soon.
Does anyone have an opinion on Joraga Treespeaker in edh? Treespeaker is an absolute house in regular cube, so I am a huge fan, but I realize that she may not have the same impact in edh. Thoughts?
To your guys' credit, your thread has inspired me to take the plunge and actually try and build an EDH cube of my own. I hope you don't mind me running some of my ideas past you since I don't have a list together to make my own thread yet.
First, I will probably use it for team sealed 2-headed giant and emperor when possible, only drafting when there are 3 or 5 players - this should speed up the deckbuilding process a bit and get people to coordinate which should be fun for my group. I'm initially shooting for 400 cards, since it would allow for 80 card stacks for 5 players to draft and 200 card sealed pools for two emperor teams. That's probably a bit tight, but I'll likely try to expand it toward the 500 or so you guys are using over time.
For the time being, the cube will only use the 10 shard and wedge 6/6 dragons as the pool of generals, and people would just pick from the pool directly instead of making a general pack to draft from. Additionally, everyone would get to see their sealed pool or first pack of cards before choosing a general, in order to keep people from screwing themselves over too much due to color identity issues. Finally, I'd probably reduce the general damage loss threshold to 18 in order to allow everyone to 3-hit each other with their dragons.
If it would be better for me to put this in a different thread somewhere else, please let me know - I've mostly posted in the EDH subforums before now.
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To be a bit more on topic, could you maybe talk about mechanical themes and archtypes you've tried to include? Multiplayer EDH doesn't seem to fit the usual cube setup of aggro, midrange, and control. Typical strategies seem to be voltron, tokens, control, cheating fatties, and combo. Do you feel you've fit a bit of all these (and any strategies I forgot) in your cube?
As for Joraga Treespeaker, I think it's okay but nothing special. You have enough other elves that it's upper level stuff is at least potentially viable.
I am glad you asked that question. I think that is something we may have strayed away from in a few of our colors because the identity of those colors, especially red, are so different in edh than they are in a "regular" cube. I knew there was something about where the cube had gotten to that needed to be tightened up, but I wasn't quite sure what it was until you asked that question.
As far as supporting themes go, it all starts with the generals. We wanted the games to be centralized around the generals rather than just a bunch of high curved, good stuff decks, so we really wanted to focused on making sure the generals had the tools they needed to become attractive game pieces. Like I said, I think the list we have now may not reflect that perfectly because we changed quite a few of the generals, but once LostCondottiere and I get a chance we will go through the list again and try to tighten it up. At that point we'll be able to answer that question more thoroughly.
To give you an idea though, we stuck with white's themes very well. In white, the strongest themes were aggression, tokens, and control. Turns out that isn't too much different from a regular cube, but the way you support aggressive strategies in edh is very different. You will never win a game dropping weenies from turn 1 as a strategy, but if the threats you drop still come out earlier, but have a lasting effect or are harder to remove, then smaller creatures can still be utilized, but in conjunction with effects that protect your team. Smaller in this case is 3 to 5 drops. Merging the aggressive support with the token support saved a lot of room, and will hopefully make up for the redundancy aggro strategies traditionally require in cube. Rebuilding after a sweeper becomes that much easier with tokens.
Beefing up the artifact and enchantment theme in white was not hard either as enchantments play a much bigger role in edh than in a faster cube format.
As for control, well, the white spell suite speaks for itself.
Big update coming soon, lots of changes. Theogony and I went through the entire cube, trimmed some redundancies, made a general swap, and added a lot to better support each color pie and their corresponding generals.
Edit: Update is complete and changes reflected in post #1.
For those of use who hate having to change pages to see what's going on, I will post this here as well:
Generals Erayo, Soratami Ascendent ---> [CARD]Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
[/CARD]Erayo is banned as a general. Originally we thought we would allow the banned generals. But after some thought, there is a reason they are banned, and this cube is meant to be fun, not uber-spike.
Colorless Phyrexian Metamorph(Moved to Blue) ----> Expedition Map Birthing Pod ----> High Market
You can see that Birthing Pod did not make it into green. I was never comfortable with this card anyway and that comes from my experience managing a "regular" cube. I feel it's just too hard to build around consistently in addition to building around your general.
Blue Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir(Moved to General) ----> Phyrexian Metamorph Minamo, School at Water's Edge ----> Control Magic
Minamo didn't interact with enough cards to justify its incusion. Control Magic is a solid utility performer however and fits with Hanna's strategy. Rewind ----> Tidespout Tyrant Beacon of Tomorrows ----> Chancellor of the Spires
There are a few blue generals that thrive off creature strategies, and blue was looking a little too anemic in the creature department. Blue will naturally lean toward spells, but if there are some good creatures that can come in, then cutting some redundancies within the spell suite to make room for them is ideal.
Black
Black also needed some bolstering in its creature section. These changes reflect that. You will see that quite a few card draw spells are being removed as well. We figured blue could be the primary card draw color and black's identity would be stronger leaning toward anti-card-advantage. Butcher, Anowon, Obliterator, and Magus all fit this theme. Also, to facilitate this and a few of our generals, token and reanimator strategies got a little more love.
Red
Red needed creature additions to facilitate a few of its generals. We decreased the mass land destruction to help keep the games fun, but didn't cut it altogether to give red a bit more depth. Some good come into play effects, and some red card advantage was included.
LostCodottiere may have more to say on individual card swaps, but from my birds eye vantage point these swaps look to better support the strategies of the generals in those colors.
If you guys have any comments on any of these changes, we are happy to hear them. If you think there are important cards we are missing from our sections to support our generals, please let us know. Thanks for your interest.
Don't have much more to add that Theogony hasn't already said. I think we've essentially finished with the major cutting. From now on we'll be covering minor tweaks here and there as we play the cube more.
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Green Sun's Zenith -> Vorapede
We have quite a few tutors in green, and GSZ is the most restrictive. I have no doubt it would be a great card, but I think the other tutors are better. Vorapede is an amazing 5 drop that lives through a wrath, and leaves itself available to block after it swings. Too good to pass up.
Harrow -> Verdant Force
We have 16 ramp spells in green alone. Harrow is the worst of them providing no actual card advantage. Another fatty to ramp into is good in green, and it has synergy with some other strategies, Earthcraft, Kamahl, Fist of Krosa, Goblin Bombardment, Hero of Oxid Ridge, any black global sac effects, and any white token themes.
Corpse Connoisseur -> Buried Alive
The 5cc slot in black is stacked. Buried Alive is a better version of the same effect. It doesn't come on a body unfortunately, but it comes out earlier which is good for reanimator, it finds more targets immediately which helps get around gy hate, and it has some synergy with cards like Yawgmoth's Will, Oversold Cemetery, and Volrath's Stronghold.
Bloodgift Demon -> Diabolic Servitude
Another five drop, and it produces an effect we already have two of. Taking a page out of wtwlf's book, adding another support card for gy.dec will only strengthen black. Servitude has synergy with all of the global sac effects we've added into black, and without Recurring Nightmare, it's the next best option for abusing etb effects in black. This should be a great source of card advantage that plays to how we have shaped black's color identity.
City of Ass -> Lotus Vale
I didn't realize that Uncards weren't EDH legal so this one's got to go. LC and I think Vale will be a solid performer with all the triple cc cost among these cards. A high pick for sure. LD isn't so rampant that it should lead to blow out plays very often either.
So we were finally able to get all the cards in that we needed to build the cube and play it last night. The results were a resounding home run from all players (five total). It was a fantastic night of Magic.
We started off with the aforementioned "general draft." We slightly altered the original process, and instead of drafting packs of five generals we drafted packs of seven generals. Once each player drafted seven generals, we drafted our regular pools - nine packs of nine cards for each player. No player had any trouble drafting colors for a general. In fact, after the pools were drafted, we decided as a group on the spot to increase the deck minimum size to 80 cards. Our pools were far too large to possibly build an appropriate 60 card deck, and it ended up working out very well. The 80 card decks really allowed for a much closer "EDH feel", avoided decking, and made the vast number of tutor spells in the cube that much more powerful.
There ended up being a Ghave deck, a Nath deck, a Riku deck, a Zedruu deck, and a Vish Kal deck. Black and white both seemed VERY strong due to their removal suites. But the play of the night ended up being a Wild Ricochet on an epic Eternal Dominion. The Wild Ricochet player (Theogony himself) had previously gained a Venser, the Sojourner emblem, as well.
Very fun night of Magic, and the cube played as well as it could possibly be played for its first run. We all agreed we needed to iron out rule technicalities like pool sizes, deck minimum sizes, etc., but that's it. Everything else played like a dream.
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Good report LC. We should have another report from tonight to provide a little more initial data, and hopefully we come up with enough to create a unified edh cube theory the way quite a few of the regular posters here have for archetype balanced cubes.
@rath: We started with 40 life so players had time to get to these monster spells we included and so no one could be blown off the table without a real chance to respond.
We had another great night of EDH cube goodness last night. We decided to keep the same format as before: nine packs of nine cards, 81 card pools, 80 card deck minimum. We've also implemented a couple rules that I previously had not mentioned. Out of your general pool, you may play another general in your deck as long as it adheres to your primary general's color identity. Additionally, if you draft a legendary creature in the primary draft, you may play it as your general. The "general draft" exists simply to assure you a general.
Last night we ended up with a Vendilion Clique deck, another Riku deck, another Ghave deck, and a Gaddock Teeg deck. Gaddock Teeg had a target on his head the entire night, especially from the Vendilion Clique and Riku players. In our first game, Teeg was tucked twice but was found with a Primal Command, and then with Primal Command again after a Regrowth. The Gaddock Teeg deck won the first game, and the Riku player came out on top in the second game.
Overall, there were some insane plays last night. The Riku player had a quadruple Chaos Warp (doubled the Chaos Warp itself with Riku, then doubled a Reverberate targeting the Chaos Warp). The Gaddock Teeg player was able to flash in Rampaging Baloths, Kamahl Fist of Krosa, and Mother of Runes end of turn with Winding Canyons and Mirari's Wake. The Ghave player had a makeshift artifact/enchantment machine gun in game one with Ghave itself and Aura Shards. The Riku player also had a triple Eternal Witness due to Riku and Doubling Season. And the Gaddock Teeg player at one point attacked for 44 points of damage with the combined efforts of Kamahl animated lands, Kamahl overrun, Baloth tokens, and Mirari's Wake.
Overall, another crazy, awesome, fun night of Magic.
We have decided to decrease the deck sizes in an attempt to gain some greater consistency to our decks. We will be trying eight packs of eight cards (64 card pools) and 60 card deck minimums. We feel that the 80 card decks, while allowing for a lot of creativity and room to build, are too inconsistent and allow for too much variance. By decreasing the pools and deck sizes, we hope to see more of our decks and allow for some tighter deck building and plays.
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I'm interested in hearing how your group likes mono colored generals in the general draft phase. Using my own cube, I've only used multicolored dudes during that portion of the draft, but include tons on mono colored legends in the main, in case anyone wants to cut that way. So far, my draft sessions have been fairly small, so I've always hedged my bets with bi and tri color drafting.
Interesting stuff otherwise! How have you like the size of your cube? Mine's at 670, and I still feel I could make it bigger!
This cube is a work in progress!!! We have decided to share our idea with MTGS in not only an attempt to further improve our cube, but to grow what we feel is a unique and fun idea. Our card decisions are directly based on what we feel are important staples in the EDH format. We are open to any and all suggestions. However, please understand that there are many unorthodox card decisions within this cube, as well as a higher mana curve than normal. These aspects are directly related to the cube being geared toward EDH and EDH only. So before we are vilified for not including Lightning Bolt, please keep this in mind. Additionally, for more cube goodness, please see the link in my signature to Theogony IX's traditional 360 cube, one he has maintained and improved for over two years now.
Cube:
51 Generals
76 of Each Color
100 Gold/Multi-Colored
96 Colorless
Power: No
Un-Cards: No
Portal: Yes
Snow: No
Sideboards: No
Proxies: Yes
Functional Reprints: Yes
Perfect Creature/Non-Creature Balance: No
Perfectly Balanced CMC: No
Banned as Generals:
Banned Cards:
Supports up to 8 players
67 cards deck (66 card deck, plus 1 general)
40 life
21 lethal general damage
1 - 4 Players Sealed: 144 card sealed pool, 8 random generals
4 - 6 Players Draft: 72 card draft pool, 9 packs of 8 cards, 1 draft pack of 5 generals
7 - 8 Players Draft: 72 card draft pool, 6 packs of 12 cards, 1 draft pack of 4 generals
Each player will draft a pool of generals first, followed by a more traditional drafting of a 67 card deck. Each players' general pool will, theoretically, drive their decisions when drafting their decks. There are, technically, two cubes. The 32 card General cube, and a more traditional 576 card cube.
View cube on cubetutor here: EDH Draft Pool | EDH Generals Pool
Running a simulated draft or sealed pool on cubetutor:
1. Open a link to the Generals Pool and click on the sealed tab. Open a single sealed back of between 5 and 9 cards. These will be the generals you start your draft will.
2. Open a link to the Draft Pool and click on the draft tab.
3a. If you want to simulate a draft of 7-8 players, set the packs to be 12 cards each, 6 packs in total, and 6-7 bots.
3b. If you want to simulate a draft of 5-6 players, set the packs to be 9 cards each, 8 packs in total, and 4-5 bots.
3c. If you want to simulate a draft of 3-4 players, set the packs to be 8 cards each, 9 packs in total, and 2-3 bots.
3d. If you want to make a sealed pool, open 12 packs of 12 cards each.
4. Build your deck to contain 66 cards. The 67th card will be your general. We have found that decks should include between 28 and 30 lands. This leaves 36 to 38 spell slots.
5. Enjoy your simulated cubing experience.
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Guild
Shard
Wedge
5-Color
UUUUU
BBBBB
RRRRR
GGGGG
WWWWW
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Kor Haven
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Blue Sun's Zenith
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Academy Ruins
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Yavimaya Hollow
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WUWUW
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UBUBU
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BRBRB
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RGRGR
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GUGUG
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URURU
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RWRWR
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WBWBW
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BGBGB
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Skullclamp
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Batterskull
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Mana Crypt
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Thran Dynamo
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Gilded Lotus
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Dreamstone Hedron
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Karn, Silver Golem
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Tormod's Crypt
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Utility Land
Last updated 8/26/2012.
Creature: 36%
Sorcery: 15%
Land: 13%
Artifact: 12%
Enchantment: 12%
Instant: 9%
Planeswalker: 3%
Conclusion: Like all cubes, much of the game is centered around combat. However, the politics of the game warp combat in many ways, making non-creature spells the more vital tools in a player's deck.
Mana Requirements
White: 20%
Blue: 21%
Black: 21%
Red: 18%
Green: 20%
Conclusion: Red is our least mana intensive color - fixing can be less of a priority. Blue and black are the most mana intensive colors - fixing should be a high priority.
Curve
Average Converted Mana Cost: 4.21
0 cmc: 3 cards
1 cmc: 35 cards
2 cmc: 67 cards
3 cmc: 108 cards
4 cmc: 84 cards
5 cmc: 86 cards
6 cmc: 68 cards
7 cmc: 39 cards
8 cmc: 21 cards
9 cmc: 3 cards
10 cmc: 3 cards
11 cmc: 2 cards
12 cmc: 1 cards
Conclusion: The peak of the curve plateau's across converted mana cost 3, 4 and 5. Between turn 4 and turn 5 is when games start to really move. If by the end of turn 6 you have not been able to start moving your game plan along, you will fall behind and be at an extreme disadvantage without a board reset or some way to accelerate your position.
Display cube statistics
[640][Commander] Wildfire393's EDH Cube
[745][Commander] Dolono's EDH Cube
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Ghost Council of Orzhova ---> Vish Kal, Blood Arbiter
Anxiously awaiting the first real response to this thread, lol.
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Hell, let's just R&D our own RWU general.
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Lol, if all else fails, I'm down. Numot is boring though, and Zedruu might be better than we think. I really think we should give him a shot. I think he brings more to the table than Numot does, even if he isn't the most spikey intuitive general. He abuses the political game rather than the card game which is really interesting and provides more depth. Besides, Numot has almost zero support in rwu for what he does (3-4 cards), while Zedruu can abuse propaganda/prison, red's fork effects to destroy other's stuff but give them things to maintain the alliance; negate the political downside to blue's counter magic; give away white's static enchantments where it doesn't matter who controls them; mass distribute white's tokens at the end of your opponents' turns to draw a ton of cards; Homeward Path. I don't know man, the more I think about him the more I think he'll be really good, and fun to build around.
Edit: I really just want to the opportunity to say to someone, "Why are you mad at me over your hard cast Akroma being a 1/1, do nothing, ground beater? He's the one with Humility," and then point to the guy playing Momir as his general.
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
The rest of the changes reflect a decision to respect the rules of commander a bit more. We've removed things like Recurring Nightmare, Tinker, Gifts Ungiven, and Balance - cards that are and have been banned in most EDH circles for a long time. We have also attempted to include more EDH staples (Splinter Twin, Eternal Dominion, etc.) as well as political and multiplayer centric spells (Archangel of Strife, Browbeat, etc.).
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1. Shouldn't the Phyrexian Mana cards be included with their color? I get that they are essentially colorless for actual casting purposes, but unless you ignore the color identity rule for deck construction only certain decks can use them.
2. Any thoughts on using any of the artifact land fixers like Traveler's Amulet, Wanderers's Twig, or Armillary Sphere? I think they're underrated, especially in non-green decks - Sphere in particular is great for giving certain colors access to hitting all their land drops and card advantage. Similarly, no Evolving Wilds or Terramorphic Expanse?
3. Even if you leave out all the stuff from above, Expedition Map is a great EDH staple that seems to be missing from your list.
Good point on the phyrexian mana costs and color identity rules. We will look into making some adjustments.
As far as artifacts like Expedition Map go, we will look to make some cuts. The colorless section already feels very tight, but I'm sure there is wiggle room. We tried to include all the essential mana rocks, as well.
@Rathkeaux
The subject of 40 life games, 60 card decks, and the possibility of decking yourself has come up quite a bit in discussion. We are definitely open to changing this "rule" because this is essentially a virgin format. Our justification is that going from a constructed format like standard (60 cards) to a limited format (40 cards) sees a 33.3% drop in deck size while still retaining the regular 20 life total. EDH constructed sees 100 card decks. A 33.3% drop would be 66 card decks. We figured 60 was a nice round number everyone was already familiar with. The more we play the cube the better we will be able to gauge whether or not we should adjust the deck size limit.
The cube is designed to support both multiplayer and 1v1 EDH.
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Yeah, Rathkeaux, there are a few formatting errors in the op that we need to correct, they will undoubtedly be corrected over time as we fiddle with the list, but thank you for that one. I'm not sure we would have caught that any time soon.
Does anyone have an opinion on Joraga Treespeaker in edh? Treespeaker is an absolute house in regular cube, so I am a huge fan, but I realize that she may not have the same impact in edh. Thoughts?
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
First, I will probably use it for team sealed 2-headed giant and emperor when possible, only drafting when there are 3 or 5 players - this should speed up the deckbuilding process a bit and get people to coordinate which should be fun for my group. I'm initially shooting for 400 cards, since it would allow for 80 card stacks for 5 players to draft and 200 card sealed pools for two emperor teams. That's probably a bit tight, but I'll likely try to expand it toward the 500 or so you guys are using over time.
For the time being, the cube will only use the 10 shard and wedge 6/6 dragons as the pool of generals, and people would just pick from the pool directly instead of making a general pack to draft from. Additionally, everyone would get to see their sealed pool or first pack of cards before choosing a general, in order to keep people from screwing themselves over too much due to color identity issues. Finally, I'd probably reduce the general damage loss threshold to 18 in order to allow everyone to 3-hit each other with their dragons.
If it would be better for me to put this in a different thread somewhere else, please let me know - I've mostly posted in the EDH subforums before now.
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To be a bit more on topic, could you maybe talk about mechanical themes and archtypes you've tried to include? Multiplayer EDH doesn't seem to fit the usual cube setup of aggro, midrange, and control. Typical strategies seem to be voltron, tokens, control, cheating fatties, and combo. Do you feel you've fit a bit of all these (and any strategies I forgot) in your cube?
As for Joraga Treespeaker, I think it's okay but nothing special. You have enough other elves that it's upper level stuff is at least potentially viable.
As far as supporting themes go, it all starts with the generals. We wanted the games to be centralized around the generals rather than just a bunch of high curved, good stuff decks, so we really wanted to focused on making sure the generals had the tools they needed to become attractive game pieces. Like I said, I think the list we have now may not reflect that perfectly because we changed quite a few of the generals, but once LostCondottiere and I get a chance we will go through the list again and try to tighten it up. At that point we'll be able to answer that question more thoroughly.
To give you an idea though, we stuck with white's themes very well. In white, the strongest themes were aggression, tokens, and control. Turns out that isn't too much different from a regular cube, but the way you support aggressive strategies in edh is very different. You will never win a game dropping weenies from turn 1 as a strategy, but if the threats you drop still come out earlier, but have a lasting effect or are harder to remove, then smaller creatures can still be utilized, but in conjunction with effects that protect your team. Smaller in this case is 3 to 5 drops. Merging the aggressive support with the token support saved a lot of room, and will hopefully make up for the redundancy aggro strategies traditionally require in cube. Rebuilding after a sweeper becomes that much easier with tokens.
Beefing up the artifact and enchantment theme in white was not hard either as enchantments play a much bigger role in edh than in a faster cube format.
As for control, well, the white spell suite speaks for itself.
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
Edit: Update is complete and changes reflected in post #1.
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Generals
Erayo, Soratami Ascendent ---> [CARD]Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir
[/CARD]Erayo is banned as a general. Originally we thought we would allow the banned generals. But after some thought, there is a reason they are banned, and this cube is meant to be fun, not uber-spike.
Colorless
Phyrexian Metamorph(Moved to Blue) ----> Expedition Map
Birthing Pod ----> High Market
You can see that Birthing Pod did not make it into green. I was never comfortable with this card anyway and that comes from my experience managing a "regular" cube. I feel it's just too hard to build around consistently in addition to building around your general.
Blue
Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir(Moved to General) ----> Phyrexian Metamorph
Minamo, School at Water's Edge ----> Control Magic
Minamo didn't interact with enough cards to justify its incusion. Control Magic is a solid utility performer however and fits with Hanna's strategy.
Rewind ----> Tidespout Tyrant
Beacon of Tomorrows ----> Chancellor of the Spires
There are a few blue generals that thrive off creature strategies, and blue was looking a little too anemic in the creature department. Blue will naturally lean toward spells, but if there are some good creatures that can come in, then cutting some redundancies within the spell suite to make room for them is ideal.
Black
Black also needed some bolstering in its creature section. These changes reflect that. You will see that quite a few card draw spells are being removed as well. We figured blue could be the primary card draw color and black's identity would be stronger leaning toward anti-card-advantage. Butcher, Anowon, Obliterator, and Magus all fit this theme. Also, to facilitate this and a few of our generals, token and reanimator strategies got a little more love.
Myojin of Night's Reach ----> Dread
Dread is a bit easier to cast in a color already stacked with heavy color requirements and this guy is also a very political creature.
Skeletal Scrying ----> Butcher of Malakir
Death Cloud ----> Anowon, the Ruin Sage
Bloodchief Ascension ----> Chainer, Dementia Master
Ancient Craving ----> Phyrexian Obliterator
Consuming Vapors ----> Magus of the Abyss
Twilight's Call ----> Bloodline Keeper
Cannibalize ----> Endrek Sahr, Master Breeder
Red
Red needed creature additions to facilitate a few of its generals. We decreased the mass land destruction to help keep the games fun, but didn't cut it altogether to give red a bit more depth. Some good come into play effects, and some red card advantage was included.
Devastation ----> Mana Charged Dragon
This dragon scares me, but I think it just adds to the political nature of multiplayer games separating this cube from our spike-cube.
Jokulhaups ----> Ingot Chewer
Molten Disaster ----> Hoarding Dragon
Blood Moon ----> Rakka Mar
Boom / Bust ----> Avalanche Riders
Gratuitous Violence ----> Flametongue Kavu
Shattering Pulse ----> Conquering Manticore
Spinerock Knoll ----> Flameblast Dragon
Green
Wood Elves -----> Woodfall Primus
Primus just needed to be included.
LostCodottiere may have more to say on individual card swaps, but from my birds eye vantage point these swaps look to better support the strategies of the generals in those colors.
If you guys have any comments on any of these changes, we are happy to hear them. If you think there are important cards we are missing from our sections to support our generals, please let us know. Thanks for your interest.
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
Tolarian Academy(Banned) -> Whispersilk Cloak
General protection and a good way to get in with general damage.
Plague Boiler(Multicolored) -> Helm of Possession
Turns smaller utility dudes and tokens into your opponent's best creature
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
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Conqueror's Pledge -> Increasing Devotion
I see this as more of an upgrade than anything else. I like the way Devotion plays out more than Pledge.
Green Sun's Zenith -> Vorapede
We have quite a few tutors in green, and GSZ is the most restrictive. I have no doubt it would be a great card, but I think the other tutors are better. Vorapede is an amazing 5 drop that lives through a wrath, and leaves itself available to block after it swings. Too good to pass up.
Harrow -> Verdant Force
We have 16 ramp spells in green alone. Harrow is the worst of them providing no actual card advantage. Another fatty to ramp into is good in green, and it has synergy with some other strategies, Earthcraft, Kamahl, Fist of Krosa, Goblin Bombardment, Hero of Oxid Ridge, any black global sac effects, and any white token themes.
Corpse Connoisseur -> Buried Alive
The 5cc slot in black is stacked. Buried Alive is a better version of the same effect. It doesn't come on a body unfortunately, but it comes out earlier which is good for reanimator, it finds more targets immediately which helps get around gy hate, and it has some synergy with cards like Yawgmoth's Will, Oversold Cemetery, and Volrath's Stronghold.
Bloodgift Demon -> Diabolic Servitude
Another five drop, and it produces an effect we already have two of. Taking a page out of wtwlf's book, adding another support card for gy.dec will only strengthen black. Servitude has synergy with all of the global sac effects we've added into black, and without Recurring Nightmare, it's the next best option for abusing etb effects in black. This should be a great source of card advantage that plays to how we have shaped black's color identity.
City of Ass -> Lotus Vale
I didn't realize that Uncards weren't EDH legal so this one's got to go. LC and I think Vale will be a solid performer with all the triple cc cost among these cards. A high pick for sure. LD isn't so rampant that it should lead to blow out plays very often either.
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
We started off with the aforementioned "general draft." We slightly altered the original process, and instead of drafting packs of five generals we drafted packs of seven generals. Once each player drafted seven generals, we drafted our regular pools - nine packs of nine cards for each player. No player had any trouble drafting colors for a general. In fact, after the pools were drafted, we decided as a group on the spot to increase the deck minimum size to 80 cards. Our pools were far too large to possibly build an appropriate 60 card deck, and it ended up working out very well. The 80 card decks really allowed for a much closer "EDH feel", avoided decking, and made the vast number of tutor spells in the cube that much more powerful.
There ended up being a Ghave deck, a Nath deck, a Riku deck, a Zedruu deck, and a Vish Kal deck. Black and white both seemed VERY strong due to their removal suites. But the play of the night ended up being a Wild Ricochet on an epic Eternal Dominion. The Wild Ricochet player (Theogony himself) had previously gained a Venser, the Sojourner emblem, as well.
Very fun night of Magic, and the cube played as well as it could possibly be played for its first run. We all agreed we needed to iron out rule technicalities like pool sizes, deck minimum sizes, etc., but that's it. Everything else played like a dream.
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@rath: We started with 40 life so players had time to get to these monster spells we included and so no one could be blown off the table without a real chance to respond.
360 Unpowered Cube | Cubetutor
Last night we ended up with a Vendilion Clique deck, another Riku deck, another Ghave deck, and a Gaddock Teeg deck. Gaddock Teeg had a target on his head the entire night, especially from the Vendilion Clique and Riku players. In our first game, Teeg was tucked twice but was found with a Primal Command, and then with Primal Command again after a Regrowth. The Gaddock Teeg deck won the first game, and the Riku player came out on top in the second game.
Overall, there were some insane plays last night. The Riku player had a quadruple Chaos Warp (doubled the Chaos Warp itself with Riku, then doubled a Reverberate targeting the Chaos Warp). The Gaddock Teeg player was able to flash in Rampaging Baloths, Kamahl Fist of Krosa, and Mother of Runes end of turn with Winding Canyons and Mirari's Wake. The Ghave player had a makeshift artifact/enchantment machine gun in game one with Ghave itself and Aura Shards. The Riku player also had a triple Eternal Witness due to Riku and Doubling Season. And the Gaddock Teeg player at one point attacked for 44 points of damage with the combined efforts of Kamahl animated lands, Kamahl overrun, Baloth tokens, and Mirari's Wake.
Overall, another crazy, awesome, fun night of Magic.
We have decided to decrease the deck sizes in an attempt to gain some greater consistency to our decks. We will be trying eight packs of eight cards (64 card pools) and 60 card deck minimums. We feel that the 80 card decks, while allowing for a lot of creativity and room to build, are too inconsistent and allow for too much variance. By decreasing the pools and deck sizes, we hope to see more of our decks and allow for some tighter deck building and plays.
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Interesting stuff otherwise! How have you like the size of your cube? Mine's at 670, and I still feel I could make it bigger!
"Personally I love high-riak, low-reqars gambles. Life's best with a decent amount of riak. And f*** reqars."