Sunday, June 14, 2009

Spring Cleaning

While the namesake card is not in the cube, I did make some fairly dramatic changes to the cube to move it in the right direction. Here's the take-away style summary:
  1. More chicks, less tricks. By upping the creature count the cube feels more smooth and natural in terms of Limited play.
  2. Better tricks and tricks on sticks. By keeping the best tricks and swapping in creatures that have a trick stapled onto it play is stronger and more efficient both more like a cube should be.
  3. Domain in twain. By scaling back the inclusion of domain mechanic cards, I made room to more general efficiency and creatures. However, domain should still have enough presence to be a great subtheme.
  4. Slivers in 'da house. Slivers are included and should help promote a minor tribal subtheme.
  5. Colored shift. By cutting out some lands and artifacts and upping the monocolor count the cube feels more similar to a traditional cube than before (and this is a good thing).
However, some questions still concern me and they won't be answers without more testing:
  1. Is there still too much mana fixing? If so, where is the weakest fixing? Did I miss something better?
  2. Are there enough creatures now? If not, what spells can be shifted into a creatures (a la Tin Street Hooligan)? What spells can be outright cut for creatures?
  3. Do shard-based archetypes bear fruit? If there enough depth in monocolor cards and allied cards to make a two color deck (or if I've really screwed up a monocolor deck!) viable or better than the three-or-more color possibilities?
  4. Are domain and sliver compatible or competing subthemes? What can be some to bring synergy between archetypes and themes traditionally present in one or two colors to be meaningfully integrated for three-or-more color decks?
  5. What the hell did I screw up and overlook?
I'm looking forward to any feedback; you can find the thread that details the breakdown of the cube by color and creature/noncreature, with links by card, at the PMC thread on MTGSalvation.

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