US Nationals and the PMC - Part 1

Magic has been in Nationals season for quite awhile - this weekend is bringing us United States, Germany, and Great Britain's tournament of national champions.  Clearly, this means I get to participate.

While I won't be a competitor this year (or, any foreseeable year for that matter) I did have the immense honor of being invited to be part of the Event Coverage team, courtesy of Wizards.  Part of being on the coverage team is doing honest work -  of which the bulk of it is Friday through Sunday - but other parts are a little less structured.  While I'm looking forward to sharing more of the experiences in my soon-to-be-made Serious Fun article, the best part of the trip so far has been the opportunity to share my cube.

I'm a bit passionate about it and, if you're reading this, I hope you can see it.

Here are two changes I've made since the past post:

WHITE:
Out: Cloud Crusader
In: Shu Cavalry

BLACK:
Out: Twisted Abomination
In: Sinkhole

White got a clear upgrade while black... I'm not as sure about.  The big guy is annoying to fight against but (more on this in a second) punished bouncelands is something I'm interested in.

ARTIFACT:
Out: All 10 Signets

Green now is truly the ramp and color fixing pieces of the pie and based on the very sharp guys who drafted it (including a full 8-man with Zac Hill, Gregory Marques, Nate Price, Monty Ashley, Dave Guskin, and more) there wasn't a single complaint about signets missing.  Bouncelands were picked higher than before but came at the cost of a better on-color pick.  In the multiple rounds I played I didn't draft a single bounceland and didn't miss them in my two-color aggro decks.  However, the three, four, and five color control decks loved grabbing these up.

Control strategies are starting to emerge cleaner, with both U/X and U/x moving alongside the multicolor specials.  Things look good there so far.

The other big take away was that my cube feels very similar to a normal limited environment.  Except more, better  removal and even more, better critters to fight and kill with.  Smiles were all around.

Multicolor is still a bit fuzzy and ironing out what archetypes need which colors and why will help me as I look to trim the gold pot down slightly again.

Check out the latest list or chime in with a question: I'm all for sharing and exploring where next my cube can go.