All The Different Types Of Cube | Part One | #107

In this episode Dan and James discuss all the different types of cube out there, what they are best for, and how to get the most out of them.

Timecodes:
1:09 - Powered Cubes
14:27 - Restriction Based Cubes
30:26 - Cubes where you remove something
37:45 - Cubes where you add something
45:45 - Set Cubes
54:39 - Cube Quiz!! - I'm sorry I haven't a Cube!

Card Gallery: https://moxfield.com/decks/ZlIQN8TId0u4uTpH5Hr-6w

Video Version: https://youtu.be/xRKmBHH-zZY

Cube Skeleton Episode: https://youtu.be/92aS4ZU_nd8

My Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/sweet
The Treat Yourself Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/treatyourself
James Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/ba642a54-a6c7-4587-b97e-1d95429c59b5
MTGO Vintage Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/modovintage

Social Links: https://linktr.ee/toosweetmtg

Runaway by Diamond Ace | https://soundcloud.com/diamond-ace-music
Music promoted by https://www.free-stock-music.com
Creative Commons / Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0)
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/deed.en_US

Transcript

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Hello everyone. Welcome back to PowerPoint and Magic The Other in Q podcast. I'm your host, Dan, and as always I'm joined by James. James. How are you doing this week? Yeah, I'm pretty good Dan and forget how are you? I'm doing well. Thank you. Yeah, I'm doing all right. And as always, we have another ripper episode for everyone. Today we're going to be doing an overview of all the different types of cubes out there. We're going to call this part one to kind of save ourselves in case we miss any. But we've gone through and kind of collected all the different cubes that exist and kind of bundled them into different categories. We're going to talk about them, what makes them great. So hopefully you can work out where your cube fits into them out and give you some ideas to optimize them or give you some cool ideas for building a new cube yourself. The cat also says hello! Before we get into our main episode. As always, just a quick reminder. Time codes and a card gallery will be down in the show notes below. If you want to see the pretty cards we're talking about, or jump to any specific types of cube, there'll also be a link to a video version if you want to see the pretty pictures. Move around the screen while you're down there, please consider giving the podcast a thumbs up. Greatly helps us out. And just like last week, we'll be continuing our cube quiz game that will be at the end of the episode as well. All right, James, let's jump in with our main topic today. So let's talk about some of the different types of cubes. I think the most obvious place to start James is powered cubes now is speaking. These are cubes that are trying to run around the best card possible, but kind of like from a goal point of view. James, if you're building a powered cube or you're playing a game, what kind of are you looking to get out of that environment? Yeah, I think there's quite a set power cube experience at this point, isn't that? And I love power Cube. I think it's great. I think it can be really great. The thing that is unique about Powered Cube, right. But aside from having power, obviously is, the ceiling of what your decks can be is so much power higher. And that's pretty exciting, right? I think it's not for everyone, but if you're someone who gets excited by the potential to draft something really bust, even if that doesn't happen every single time, then I think powered Cube is is really, really cool. And it offers alpha such a big range in what you can do. Right? It's not it's not. Here's ten archetypes. Fake one. It's, all the different cards can offer so many different avenues and so many different ways to combine them to do powerful things. Which is very, very cool. That being said, is probably not for everyone. There are a couple of downsides. Firstly, you play a lot more non games in Power Cube. If you're someone who gets frustrated when your opponent has three pieces of power in their opening hand and absolutely small, soon you're never in the game, then. How it cube might be annoying for you if you're someone who's like, oh, that was cool, let's shuffle off and go again. And, you'll probably enjoy a lot more of it, but there is the thing of you sometimes just get vintage cubes and you've got to be okay with that. You know? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. With these kind of super high powered cubes like the MC go vintage cube, like the arena powered cube, or even like the Max powered Vintage Cube we've seen every now and then there was kind of like this social contract going into it that just kind of like we're all trying to do the broken things, and you kind of have to accept that that might happen to you. Like you might just get steamrolled, but you also might steamroll someone. That's kind of a selling point. But it's also something that kind of like you're agreeing to happen when you load up and drop one of these cubes. Yeah, for sure. I mean, that's similar to something I'm quite on board for a friend in the Ice Cube. Fairly like to me, part of me, because we play it, people tend to play a lot of commando and multiplayer stuff where there is a bit more of like a social contract of don't do stuff that is going to take much time and not be that fun for the rest of the table. In a two player game, because two player games are so quick, it's a bit less of an issue. And, I think one of the appeals of cube in some ways is you get to do all the busts and stuff that, your commander table would get mad at you for, and I think that's quite cool. And Powered Cube is certainly a great place to do that. Like, whole beaches, ferries, puzzle box. I imagine will get you kicked out of many commander tables, but in, in tiled cube. Very, very fun. I think Hull Breacher is now banned, actually. And I mean, that sounds like a great choice. Yeah. No no, no, but like like like, I guess kind of like narrowing it down, like the goal of these cubes is to make an environment where you can support all these cards, like, kind of like the mega of Vintage Cube and the Arena Power Cube are not ten are like they're running. I would say like 95% of the most broken cards, right? Like I think the arena power keepers just added that monarchy to it, but it doesn't have. But like, the max power would mean just cube is running like things like Glee, Max and someone like the, cards that are just dumb and also like, all the initiative cards. Kind of like like, like these are the these are really the only environments where you can run these and kind of like, yeah, as we've been saying, you sign up for that to do that when you go into it like and I guess like kind of we kind of touched on the pros of these for almost like the pros are, you get to play the most broken cards kind of like James. Are there any negatives would you say to like, like someone at home didn't have a cube and they thought, oh, I, I play the Mega Vintage Cube, or they way the Power Cube making their first cube be a power keep. Kind of like what should should they be considering if they are thinking of building that? I think there's a few things. So firstly, it can be a fairly punishing environment for new players. So I think it's, it's one thing to consider not just how expensive you are in building cubes, but how experienced your play group has. Because a lot of the cards don't, like, tell you, on the face of it, what to do with them. Right. And because of, very sort of well-defined archetypes that you can put in a primer and people can be to know what to do if the cards necessarily, it can be the barrier to entry is just a little bit higher. Right. And if it's your first time reading lots of these cards, it can be kind of an overwhelmingly complicated environment. I think. So I think it's it's definitely one to consider for a play group. But there's also, I think. The pilot cube experience now is quite different from, say like 5 to 10 years ago. Yeah, I would agree. It always used to be that, obviously the most powerful things are still the power 910 and manifests in all the broken mana that goes with it. But outside of that, that used to be the most powerful things you could be doing with all, all the things you had to work for a little bit. Right? It was like a channel deck of a, like a Catch Me decks or the nutty Re-Animator deck, or sneak and show or whatever. Then you sort of need a lot of pieces to come together. And that was cool. And it was. It was really exciting when you got there. But you had to take some risk and, and that's, that's a that like, adds a lot to the environment. Right. And those things are all still great. But now probably the decks for when the most are very, like built off the back of individually super strong cards that don't require much support, I think for, like primarily out of like Modern Horizons and Lord of the rings and these, sort of direct and modern sets, you know, like, can do psychic fog for failing as these cards don't require you to do any work like you just put them in your deck in your head. That kind of busted and and there's nothing wrong with that, you know, like, it's a cube that is inherently built around power, that layers like monstrous hell of a power that like a time walk. Very silly card. But it just change the experience, right? And it it phase cards, like, make you grow into that. Then, you know, you can build different cubes and that's fine. No. Exactly. Yeah. It's definitely an environment where, like, it's. Yeah, it's definitely an environment where you just can't run pet cards. Like, every card in these in this cube has to be inefficient. And like for some people who love that environment, that's a pro. But like for some people who like want to play with cards they like, you can't really fit it in. Like because every card in there is like in theory, a 540 power cube is going to basically be made up like like the best way to describe it is it's the best 540 cards in all of magic that's at their specific job, if that makes sense. I kind of like you really don't have much wiggle room to, like, test stuff or like, try pet cards or because just the power level between what is in there and like your pet card will be so volt, it will be the biggest it can possibly be and it will just not get played. Is the brutal reality with it? Like like your your pet fan cards just won't like they will go last pick and no one will play them. Yeah for sure, for sure. Oh, I actually got even worse stuff if I if someone goes in like oh that looks like a cool build around, they'll take that build around that player and gets upset in that shit because even though they built around it in a way, it's ultimately it just isn't ever power level that is required for this sort of keep. Yeah. No, there is there is a limit to, to what you can include in these cubes. There are also cards you get to include in these cubes that you don't get to include anywhere else, though. And that's kind of cool. Like one one I'm I want to try out and pay for copilot. Cube is, I think, arguably the most busted card in magic history, which no one ever plays with because it says ante on it, which is contract from below the, I think one out. James yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah. Single black move contracts from below from your deck before playing. If you're not playing fancy. Fine. Don't care about that. Discard your hand. Ante the top card of your library. Then for seven cards. A single black to draw seven. Seems a bit nuts. Yeah, and one sided as well. This is not, this is this is not 2007. This honestly may be too good for pilot Cube, which is insane, but I think it's, It would be kind of cool to try. The ante thing is interesting, so I think I've never really put ante stuff in a cube, but I think it's kind of interesting. Obviously, I'm not like keeping my cards. It's just, but if you ante and you lose, then the card disappears from your pool and it's in your opponent's pool for the rest of the draft. And I think that's quite a cool dynamic. Yeah, I like that as, like a theme or like a. Yeah, as a thing for a cube. That could be quite fun if you lean into that quite a lot, that could be quite good. Yeah, for sure. I think sadly, if you like lean into anti as a theme, then your cube is probably at that level where you can't even contract from the like. Yeah, because you have a very anti cards don't quite stack up the same, the same extent. I'm, I think next time I put powered vintage powered paper cube together I might I'm like fuck seeds contract. But I think that'd be quite fun. I say, fuck it. I'm actually looking down. It's like $2. So I guess I sand in literally everything. You see, there's literally no form that way on this card. Yeah, yeah. No. Nice. Yeah. I think there is one last con I want to touch on, actually, and it is worth like like this is one I often find with Vintage cube. Like, like again, they are fantastic formats. They're one of my favorite cubes to draft. But like it is a negative to consider is that sometimes your picks can be a little boring. For me, one of the things I like most about drafting is like the open ended in this nature of it. Like, oh, if I go down this rabbit hole, there's like these choices and stuff, but in powered cube, there's often just a correct pick liked if there's a pack with like some interesting build arounds or some efficient cause that you like, and there's just a Mox in there, you are taking the Mox like that. Like for some people, they like some people. The ability to play with power offsets everything else I'm about to say. But for me personally, kind of like I don't like to like I'm drafting on rails, if that makes sense. And just because cards like power cause like minis can do cause like foretelling is are just so, so above even in powered heaps. But above other cards in them. They're just correct choices that like you are wrong and you'll kind of your deck is so much worse by not taking them that kind of thing, you have to just kind of commit to these cards basically. I what do you think about that? Yeah, I, I certainly hear where you're coming from. I actually think this is much more of an issue with the, that you put busted. I made three cards, but the votes are slightly below the power intensive. Power level. Because the thing is, the example you gave of a Mox, like, yeah, you do have to take for marks, but, the Mox goes in every deck, right? That's not telling you what direction your draft needs to go in. It's just sort of what pick was dictated for you, assuming you're trying to win. Whereas if it's like for failing assignments can do like these cards can go in multiple different decks, but, it does feel like you're very incentivized to take that card and it pushes you in a specific direction, you know, and that does like take a little bit of agency away from you as the drafter. Yeah, I do agree on that thing. But like, like. These are still the most popular cubes out there. And also that there's still a large portion of people who like when you say cube or when you talk about cube, they just think of this because of like like LSV, like when he talks about cube, he's kind of just talking about power cubes. He's not really kind of talking about other types of cubes, that kind of stuff. But like, these are the most popular for a reason. They are fantastic, but kind of like, especially if you're building them for yourself. Those are some things to consider. I guess we should also mention if you're planning on buying it unbelievably expensive. That kind of goes without saying, but like if you're proxying it, it's becomes less of an issue because you just proxy the cards instead of however much a mox is nowadays. But some things to consider. Let's keep it going. James. Let's, talk next about restriction based cube. So this will make more sense once I kind of explain it. But like these are the cubes that I think make up the majority of cubes out there. The majority of cubes you see on Cube, Kobra or in the wild, these are the most common cubes because these are cubes that are built around the conceit that kind of we're limiting the card pool in some way, and that's what we're going with. So, so if you think of like a up a cube that's limiting your card pool, it's a restriction based on rarity. So we're restricting it to just be commons. You have a peasant cube which is restriction based on commons and on commons even like my unpowered cube, it's a restriction that is like a it's kind of taking the whole card. But I like, like power cubes are working with the whole card pool of magic. These cubes are restricting it in some way to make our card all the easier for us. So like budget cubes, the restriction is monetary. You like I have an old board of cube. The restriction that is cards printed before 2003 like you have. You have restrictions based on format. So you have like Modern Cube or Legacy Cube or Pre-modern cube. You have cubes based on planes. You have like inner stride cons or replica cubes. But like the goal with these cubes is to make the best cube within a certain bracket. And basically you are defining that bracket with the restriction, kind of like, most of the cubes that I've played and built will and my gut is most, most cube people own at home will also fit within this kind of bracket. I'm kind of James, what do you think about these types of games? Like the cubes, like the cube environment where we are taking the whole of magic, every card out there, and we're restricting in some ways kind of help our help narrow down our pool a little bit. Yeah, I think these are cool. I like these a lot that there's a lot of different ways you can go with it. I think one of the things is quite nice. It it it just makes your job a lot easier as a cube builder. Right. The, the inherent difficulty of building cubes, if it's a, you know, a new idea and you're not sitting down with a template, but you're changing if you're actually building my kids from scratch. Is that you sit down and you have. I mean, I have no idea what the total number of magic cards printed is, but it's, it's vast and there's, there's too much. There's too much to choose from. There's too many decisions. It's an inherently very daunting process. And, about 30, about 33,000 individual cards. Right? Yeah. It's a bit excessive. It's a it's a big number. It's I've got a bag of about five. And it's hard to it's very hard to divert down to your 540 or whatever. And putting some restriction on that does like gives you some got some guide rails and it gives you an onramp. Right. That's fairly nice. Also a lot of these restrictions push you towards a certain playstyle. And if that's the playstyle you enjoy then that's great. Like it is a somewhat artificial, life restriction you're imposing on yourself. And sometimes I think I almost think sometimes. Like, it's a good way to start the process is having this restriction. But then actually, once you've built the cube and you know how it plays, it's fine to take it. You know, it should be. Restriction in and of itself is not what makes for cube fun. I like hasn't cube is not fun because all the cards are in common sets. It's fun because it pushes assassin playstyle. Annable, which is interesting and very different from from most other cubes. And once you understand, like what the playstyle is you're going from what sort of cards you need to include to produce those sorts of games. It doesn't actually matter if those cards, comments on comments of theirs or squares, you know, it matters that, that they push for gameplay experience in the direction you want, but the, the, the rarity restriction is very useful for getting that. Yeah, exactly. Like for me, this is once I kind of work this out for myself, like, Once I kind of worked out the kind of, like how the restrictions can really help you just find the cards and really quickly get, like, like, these cubes are great because these work really nicely with, like, with, like the, the cube skeleton that we talked about probably about 2 or 3 months ago. A link to that would be down below if you're planning on building a cube and you're not sure where to start, I cannot stress how. I think it's just the best, easiest way to get like a functioning cube as quickly as possible. Because basically, this skeleton just gives you how many of each drop, how many have in each color and your size of cube. And then once you know what your restriction is, say it is proper. You just go to scribal search for the thing you need. Okay, I need white creatures. I need a one drop you you you add your restriction. You say it's a common card and they will just give you all the options you can pick up, pick from, and then you pick the ones you like. Your narrowing it down, and it just makes building so much easier. But like, say that was, legacy. You could make it be legal in legacy or say you want it to, to be based on it playing like in a straight as we talked about, you could put the sets to be legal from into into scribal. And then just all your options come up. Like, honestly, this is like the easiest way to build a cube once I kind of work this out. It's why this year I've built like four more cubes or have me. It's good. It's like, oh, once you kind of get on a roll with it, it's really easy. And like, that's my main negative with this actually, is that once you build one, you want to build another one and they get expensive gems, even the sleeves. Jesus. But I'm going to say I have no idea how much you sense the spent on sleeves. So yeah, I'm this month. This month, £100, sure, but, but one of the thing I do really like about these cubes is it get. These are a great on ramp for someone looking to build their first cube. But also, as you can tell, sometimes you can easily transition it. So like, you could start with a budget cube or even like a peasant cube. And then it becomes a mid powered cube and then it becomes a number as like overtime you get more confident and you start adding like, I wouldn't recommend just adding like 1 or 2 cards here or there, like, like do a big upgrade, that kind of stuff. But like there is an on ramp for you to kind of start off and to progress your cube over time and morph it up and up in power level, or all the play style getting quicker. That kind of stuff like this is the best way to do that. I think because you have that base and you have like structures that work and basically you're just replacing cards with more efficient cards like that. You kind of get in your collection over time, that kind of thing. Yeah, for sure. And it's I think once you have an understanding of how a cube plays, you'll be and you've played it a bunch of n in a, a much more competent position to make those changes. Right. It's about getting some of that in first. So you understand what sort of cards for cube needs now it makes sense. So yeah, as a reminder again, I was at a link to the cube skeleton and the episode will be down in the show notes below. If you're thinking of building a cube, give it a go. I think it will make your the whole process a lot easier for you. All right, let's keep it going. The next one overlaps a little bit with the restriction based cubes, but it is different. And that is themed cubes. This is where rather than a restriction, we are picking a theme. So like we're picking a theme to either build around or accentuate. So it could be flavor. It could be like like like. But we're coming up to spooky season, James. There's a bunch of like horror themed cubes based on like based around kind of the theme of in Ystrad and like morn, that kind of thing. It could be themed around a film like you could do, like, like there's plenty of cars now for like a mad Max style cube, that kind of stuff. And the theming could also be mechanical. It could be like run every. It could be a cube that runs every card with madness or discard cards, that kind of stuff. It could focus on color, like it could be like a three color cube or a five color cube. Focus on multi-color cards like these are themes that we're kind of working with. It could be like big splashy man environments. Again, it's not like a idea of like where you're pushing the cube. There's kind of outside the norm. Or it could be focusing on certain aspects of magic, like it could be like a graveyard themed cube or an artifact cube, like generally the how these are different to restriction based cubes is that the goal is to match the theme, if that makes sense, rather than limit the pool of cards. And like generally when you're making choices with a themed base cube, the theme is first over the raw power level. And that is a big difference in terms of what you're choosing. Like, you're less likely to put in the card that like you like, or that is technically correct with a theme. If for me, a good thing, cube as many cards in the game as possible. Match and enhance the theme rather than oh, I put this lightning bolt in because it's sufficient, if that makes sense. James yeah, for sure. I think there's a couple of different, sorts of kids squashed into this cast to create a little bit, right? So far as, the themes focused on gameplay. So like, cube trying to push like, so big, big splashy spells or trying to go multicolor or graveyard of artifacts if I like gameplay specific themes. And that's, that's about trying to create a gameplay environment that's going to be interesting and unique. And, and different and that's cool. The challenge with it is trying to build enough for VAT in, because if if everyone's a graveyard deck, it's just, is there enough distinct strategies within that, or you just going to be drafting the same pile of, melody yourself over and over telling stuff every, every single time? And you can definitely do that. It's I'm not saying it's not possible, but it's just that that's the challenge you need to be aware of when you're building. And, it also tends to be, you know, certain colors lend themselves better for theme than others, right? Like if you're building a graveyard cube, your soul tie section is going to be really easy. Yeah. What you do with borders is more interesting, and that is where you need to have a bit of creativity. But that's really important because, otherwise you just end up playing soul tie value pile nevers, ad infinitum. Yeah, I completely agree, I do too. I think it's the reason with the themed cubes that the best ones tend to have a broad theme, so I can kind of pick from a wide range of cards, but also as wide a range of archetypes of James's mentioning as possible. Like, like like with everything with, with with the other ones we mentioned. You like when you're working with, with a restriction or with or without obstruction and power cubes. You have so many cards to work from and so many archetypes with themes like, yeah, as I mentioned, like, like how do you make ten graveyard archetypes? How do you make ten artifact out of AI archetypes? Like, like like when you're picking this arc at like picking a theme to build around, stay as broad as possible because it just gives you more choices, choices and more options. Yeah. For sure, for sure. And then they have a sort of theme we've got a script in here is for more flavor based themes. So like Spooky Cube or whatever. I've never built one of these. I'm sure they're really fun to build, I bet. Like messing down the sky for for ages, finding good spooky themed cards and then putting them together is is is a good time? I think for a reason. I've never built something like this. Is that for me? For it to be, like, worth the effort of of building a cube and getting all, getting all the cards and sleeping it off and everything else, I kind of want to play it a bunch of times. And the flavor theme, while it is cool the first time you're going through it and you're like, I see what you did that, it doesn't actually adds to the replayability of the cube, right? Like after a couple of drafts, it's like, yeah, cool. I don't actually care if it's all spooky that much, you know? So I get it. Yeah, yeah, I think it's like it's partly what you're looking for out of building a cube. This. Whether this sort of cube makes sense for you. I know it's kind of why I kind of grouped flavor in with, like, mechanical architects. It's because it's, for me, the key point when you're building it is the choices you're making, like it's the choice of there's a similar line of questioning if that's the right term. I feel kind of like, oh, is this card flavor fully spooky or is it flavor? Fully work with a graveyard deck if that kind of makes sense. Because like, like like where your mind at when you're picking cards is still in the same place, you're still looking for the theme over raw power level. That's kind of like like if the difference is like in a graveyard deck in Skyfall, you're searching for the term graveyard. In a horror theme cube, you're maybe using the art search in Skyfall a bit more for sure, for sure. But the but what if is the The theme actually is relevant for game plot wave acute spy, whereas the horror theme cube is kind of just some cards that have a bag grouped by something that is not relevant to how the game is actually play out, and you almost need to, need a bit of an extra vision for how of, almost. You need a second for some secondary themes to go along with it or otherwise. You just end up with a bit of a desperate array of cards that happen to have skulls on them. You know? Well, so, so, so one reason why I think, like horror themed cubes and spooky cubes, one of the more popular flavor based cubes is because effectively, your base is like in a red. You can pick ten archetypes from all of in this thread, and then sprinkle in some stuff from other sets, like some other horror from other themed sets, as like are the things to do. That's probably one of the reasons why they're why they're one of the more successful flavor cubes. And like the other, the other one that I think people build is like, a Christmas themed cube. Like, it's no thing to keep. In theory, you're just building a cube. This like, the best of, Ice Age and, like, Modern Horizons one, that kind of stuff. You're kind of. The flavor is one thing, but the gameplay is important with that. Like, finding inspirations for that is also going to be able for a good view. But yeah, I do think these kind of all belong, the one place that makes sense. I guess one pros with these it is worth mentioning before we move on stage one is like these are quite unique environments, like, like are we going to have we touched on like, the big splashy thing I mentioned all the tri multicolored cubes, but like, my treat yourself cube would fall under here. My theming. This was more themed for us because the theme was try and go bigger, try and go splashier. And I feel it's one of the more unique cubes that I've made. And like when I've played like, artifact cubes or when I've seen great work, it's like like they are more unique environments. But I think, yeah, as James, what I like about what he touched on, they are harder to balance because you're kind of the further you go off pieced, the more you need to think about like the more just like all your choices become harder. Like we talked about last week. Like meat balancing. Why treat yourself cube? Because I because I called it treat yourself cube. If you're not treating yourself then the theme hasn't worked. So therefore there's more choices I need to think about because of that additional theming. But yeah, definitely really cool cubes. If you can make it work. The next type of cube I want to touch on, or the next types of cubes want to touch on is cubes where you take something away. Here we're talking things like desert cubes. With these, you're taking the land box away the land. Move into the cube itself. You also have cubes like the like 100 on adopters or anyone's variant of like 100 X. Basically, they're you're taking away all the other creatures. The only creatures in the in the 102 cubes are owner doctors. And all the wind cons revolve around all the adopters. Here the goal is to create an interesting and different environment. Like these are very unique cubes and when they work, they can be some of the most interesting draft environments out there. But getting to the point where they are good I think is very, very tricky. There's a bunch of other cubes like this, but kind of like James. Like, what's your experience with like deserts or cubes where like one key factor of it has been taken away? Yeah, these are really cool. I really like crafting these, especially like new ones that I haven't drafted before. I think a lot of the reason is, if you're an experienced magic player, then even drafting a new cube with a bunch of cards you haven't played off of before, you still have all the heuristics built into your head about, what's gonna what's likely to work in that draft environment, how you evaluate cards, the context in which the game is going to take place right. So even if that cube is new, all those cards are new. The, the experiences is, has familiarity. So. Right. Whereas if you make a radical change like, like having no basic plan, so or like having no creatures with power, then, it makes you reevaluate all of that, right? It's, It makes you change how you're viewing all the other cards that you've even that the ones that aren't related to that restriction. Right. Because it's completely new context in which you're drafting and building a deck and playing the games. And I think that's fairly cool. So big fan of these desert cubes are great on Fox. This is great. Any any of ones you want to try out? I think they're really cool. Worth saying though. Visa like difficult to build if I genuinely novel. Because that's not going to be templates for them and it might just not work very well. I would really recommend, adding a printer proxying like even honestly, even before you get like eight people together to draft with I would say put together some like reasonable tax what you think a couple of a decent co-op has like what would a decent version look like and just play them against each other with a friend and see how it I see how the gameplay feels because, because you're going quite far off the rails here. It can be great, but they could also crash and burn and, be aware that you might have to make like radical changes after one draft. It might not. It might not be tweaking ten cards. It might be like half a cube. Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah. Like like you may be changing the thing that you built the whole thing around because you thought of a different thing, like like 100, 100 or 100. And that this might not be the best example, but like, maybe they imagine a world where they first built it with like mem Knights. I remember like the zero mana one one without flying. Imagine if the whole thing was originally built around that, then that was, oh, that doesn't really work as well. Oh, there's only two options. Let's try that. That one change changes like it's a small change, but it changes the way every other card has been thought about. There is something to consider as well. Like like I think these are fantastic cubes and some of the most unique and fun drops I've had have been with these. But like this should not be your first cube. I just, I think one from a build point of view, but also just from a replayability point of view. Like like like I love desert some, I love on that. But like I want to do them kind of like half as much or a third as much as like my regular cube, if that makes sense. And then the other thing as well, which I think is really important when you're either thinking about this or you're building it, is pick one thing to take away, not multiple. This will also be relevant with our next one as well as like you can. Your players only have so much bandwidth in terms of like thinking because because they're already dealing with like like a desert cube. You're already thinking about, okay, I have to draft all my land. Do I have enough land to make my deck work? Is the color is going to work if you then have to worry about something else as well, like like a desert 100 on a top tier cube, for example. Should never meet like like I should never have to worry about. Do I have enough? All the doctors do I have to pay off? And do I have to drive my lands like it just gets too complicated and I think then you die by adding additional things, you are diluting what makes that cube unique. I think the best versions of these are cubes that really, they find the bit and really commit to it. 100 on adopters works because. Because there's the idea. And then they fulfilled it as much as possible. They didn't like, oh well, when if we have one other creature, that's a cool interaction. Let's do that. In like that, you're diluting it immediately. If that makes sense. Yeah, for sure, for sure. And, also I'd recommend with ease because most of these restrictions you're, you're adding a barrier to someone getting a good deck, right? I mean, and it means free decks are inherently going to be a little bit scrappier, right? They're not going to always be like it's fairly polished, tuned version, which I think is great. But I would say it doesn't lend itself well to having sort of a linear archetypes. I think you do want it to be a bit more open ended and, cards to go in like multiple different, color paths and, work in different sorts of decks, you know? Yeah. I mean, we had this when we talked about my mono blue Desert Cube a few weeks ago where, like, the deserts I've enjoyed have big themes. So, like, I think my Desert Cube has like, like there's a bunch of synergies, a bunch of packages in there. But like, realistically, the themes are like card draw artifacts, like islands matters like like it's big overarching archetypes with these because my players are focusing on other things, like, like when your players are focusing on drafting on adopters or drafting lands. So that kind of stuff, like you want to make the decks they're building a bit simpler. You don't want to have like, like it's with like powered GB. You have packages with with like restriction base keeps. You have like your ten color archetypes. Like you don't need those in these types of cubes, in cubes where you're removing something, I would generally lower the power level and also lower the complexity because it's more about, yeah, it's about part of the gold, but part of the fun part about a desert cube is is ending up with a functional deck. Not a good deck, if that makes sense. Yeah, for sure, for sure. And making that the challenges is is pretty good, I think. I think that's a very different draft experience from the one where you stick. And then on the flip side of that. So in one aspect we have cubes where we're taking stuff away. The flip side of that is cubes where we're adding something. So some good examples of this are like like dual commander. So James a dual commander cube in that you're giving everyone a commander. You have the base of the cube, but you're giving them something extra. There's also, cubes like the ball pit cube. I think lucky because they did an episode on it where in that you have to draft every card you play, but then every car can be played face down as a copy of Chromatic Sphere. On the on this podcast we theory crafted like what would it look like if every card had had morph in those cubes or giving them something extra? We've also talked about like the Square Companion Cube, which we will build at some point where they say off the draft, everyone is given a legendary squeak creature of their choice as a companion. But I've seen cubes where, kind of similar to dual commander, but like where they call like companion cubes, where every deck can have any creature as a companion in the companion zone. I've seen that with like, spells as well. You can companion a spell, these kind of stuff, you just have access to it. At the start of the game, you play three to put it into hand. Once you add something. Again, similar to what I would add, when you're removing something, it is a unique environment with an added level of complication. Like the goal is to make a unique environment like kind of like. One thing I really like about your job, Commander Cube James, is that just having access to that build around makes your deck building so different. It's really like like because the basis of your job, Commander Cube, is similar to a pilot cube or an umpire, which people are not like in terms of like you have like your curve matches of the cube. So like I'm assuming I like the choices in terms of like numbers of things, which was probably similar, but just having that additional command, which, you know, you can have access to, like you can really lean and lean and stuff and build around things in a really interesting way. You just don't get with normally a normal cube, kind of like. James. What's been your experience with with these types of cubes? Yeah, I think these can be great. Again, similar for cubes where I take something away. You're fundamentally changing the gameplay experience in a lot of ways, and you're therefore changing how you're meant to evaluate the cards, which I think is cool. I would say whatever the thing is you're adding, lean into it with your card choices. Give people ways to maximize that. Don't let it be just, it's the sort of flat bump and power level. Make it something that you can build around, and that's going to make it a lot more interesting. No. Yeah, yeah, it makes a lot of sense. Like similar to when you remove something, it's harder to use a template. And like, I know I just mentioned with James's dual command to keep it, you probably could have used a template to like get get your numbers and get how many of each like to get balancing that kind of stuff. But like there's then the additional level of will how does it work with the fact that I have commanders in there? I do like you can get templates for numbers, but what I'm trying to get across is like to actually make it work with the thing that you want to work, to actually make it work with your with your additional thing. There's a whole extra level of complexity there, kind of like there is no template for. So like, yeah, James can be told how many red three creatures he needs, but like, how many commanders do you need and what needs to be legendary? What doesn't need to be legendary? That's a whole separate thing that you I'm assuming James had to fully look at basically every creature choice like, oh, I want this effect on this creature. Is there a legendary version? Should it be a legendary version like, how was that for you? Yeah, I mean, it was it was really interesting. First challenge, I feel like it's not something I have entirely works out. I think I'm still, still focusing on it a bit. Because the other big thing is, how many legends do you have and how many potential commanders? I think for me, I figured out fairly early on was that you wanted, for example, if you want to be quite cautious with the one man or legends because, because an aggro deck that has a really good one off on turn war on every single game and therefore doesn't need to devote any other slots to one mana creatures. So it's it's never too long than later to, but it always has it on turn one. That's kind of terrifying. So like Bhagavan for example, going nowhere near that cube, And similarly, the, the wave of removal lines up, I think one change I'm looking at making, is to include removal that's a bit less punishing for the expensive legends because, I think it can be challenging to play a 4 or 5 man a legend as your commander if it's just going to die right away. In a world where other people have too many commanders, you know, it's on me. It feels like if I have $5 on winning you the game, that then you'd probably have been better off something else. As your commander. So maybe we can, have a little bit more of the removal, aimed at small features or or missing those commanders in some way. To just just redress that balance a little bit. But, yeah, I mean, that wasn't there weren't a huge amount of, of a dual commander cubes available online and none that really, seem to be going for the gameplay experience that I was going for. A lot of them were going for much more for, Something that looked like a regular commander deck, but to be played with two players, where I was more taking inspiration from like Dual Commander as a constructed format, which is more, like have cheap interaction. Feels more like a cube deck for a commander deck in lots of ways. With the upside of you have a commander rather than pivoted over some for player commander, where it's all big thing you build around, and you don't need to affect the board in the first couple of turns. No, definitely. I really like you. Don't come on here if you can tell. There's been a lot of thought there. I'd like to bring you back to our conversation about like that shows like when you go off piece like this, that shows the level of thought that kind of you need to go into to get something that works. I kind of like that, like, yo, Joe, come on, the cube. If you look at it on a base, it does look like a regular cute, but like if you look at, like the list for the ball pit cube or like if you listen back to the conversation we had about like, every card has more of like what does like if every card has more just like like that's what we've added. Like, what does the curve look like on that? These are things that they're kind of like, you're going to have to work out yourself if you go through them. And like, I do think they're kind of like cubes where you add something. These have the most potential for future like exploration because like, just what if you like, everyone starts with a card in play. Like what? Like just these are just off of my head I want to be talking about, like, you could build a cube where everyone starts with AI omniscience in play. What does that look like? Or a cube where everyone starts off with like a ley line of the guild act in play? I call that like color washes all of your spells. You could build cubes entirely around these additional things. I kind of like basically you could just pick an enchantment. I do nothing in enchantment that you like, or I do nothing artifact that you like, or a weird old like moment effect and build around that and effectively you then have a unique cube. The process for that, you're really going to have to like think about, because there is no template for that. You're going to have to work that out entirely yourself. But like as a unique environment, I think these have potentially some of the most like untapped potential of any ones we've talked about. Yeah, for sure, for sure. For, the Omniscience Trust cube sounds great. I think, have to be quite careful with power level V. They used to do, omniscience trapped on a VNA occasionally. Yeah, I'm doing a doing a feel from, I think it was dusk draft. And even with just like Duckman Commons and on Commons, it was shocking how often you could. Well, on turn one. I think that's why, similar to cubes, where you remove something, maybe not your first cube, then maybe your second cube. Yeah, I do like this. The last one we're going to talk about today anyway is, set cubes. Let's touch on them. So a set cube is a cube that's trying to replicate a draft environment. These will look very different to other cubes that we've talked about because that at their core they are always breaking Singleton. The goal with these is to try and replicate all the good parts of the limited environment, while ignoring the bad parts. So generally these are often made up of like three commons, three commons, one rare, one mythic, or they're made up of four commons, two one commons, one rare, one mythic. Basically you you are breaking singleton. You are having multiples of the commons and on commons in the draft environment. And you also often removing like the worst 10% cards like they put cards in the standard sets. So they used to just put bad cards in standard sets on purpose to kind of like as a skill tester, they've stopped doing that, but like they still put they still seed cards in. Not for the drop environment for formats like standard or modern, that kind of stuff, which like that be some cool cards, but like they just don't work in the draft environment. They are meant for other formats. So you remove those kind of weird build around the cards, or because they don't work and you're left with like the core of the draft environment. And you often with these as well, you will collect packs so that I mean as you will build a pack of 15 or 14 with new sets. Dreadful. But you will build your pack of however many commons on commons rares or mythic and like that's what people drop with. You are trying to replicate the draft environment. And what's great about these is these are kind of quite easy to put together because you have the structure ready made for you. You your only real choices. What cards are my removing from the from the draft format? These are fantastic first cubes. Especially if you really like a set. Like, I think one of my most watched videos, games like cube. It it anyway is, a Lord of the rings set when that came out because people love that format. It got a bunch of people into magic, and they wanted to play that again and again. The way you can do that is with a set key. You kind of like, what's your experience been with these games? I think these are a fun thing to build. If you basically just want to keep crafting whatever limited format it is, space out at the time, and you love and you want to draft that ad infinitum with your friends without buying new packs. Great crack on building. Exactly. I don't know if this is going to be a hot take. It's almost not really building a cube in some ways. Like, to me, a cube is creating and creating enough shots. He's not doing that, right? Yeah. You know, that's like hating the current draft environment most of the time. I would I would disagree because, like, what about people who just who start with like the Go Power Cube list? Yeah, I can't say. Yeah. Like, it's I guess the thing I'm slightly pushing back on is when we say this is a great first cube. I don't know if this gives you the experience of building a cube fairly. I would say from a logistic point of view, it does maybe not. Yes. It gives you the experience of buying lots of cars, buying lots of sneaks, putting the cards in the sleeves and correlating syntax well, using like. But the biggest thing, like making a cube like can be really daunting. Like I built my key, my cube after like years of commander, I didn't jump straight into it. I'm like, I think if you're just starting off and you want to get a cube together, and you started playing magic in the last couple years because you loved Lord of the rings, or because Marvel really got you, or Final Fantasy set cubes are a great way because like, if you really like to set and of all your friends, you're going to have a bunch of these cards you can like. It's a good use for the like the draft commons. And I'm going to say you bought some booster boxes. This is a great use for them. That is true. And I'm not saying you shouldn't tell that because, you know, if someone walks up with a, say, a shadow over in a shared set cube, I would very happily you. If that sounds great. Don't we have a friend of ours? Does have a cons like original post? Yep. No. It's cool. I think I've got an aria, from a from probably over ten years ago now. Don't worry about it. It's fine. Nice. And another thing you can do with this, which is to set cube plus, I guess is, combine just a couple of sets together that might be sat on the same plane or something. So for example, I've seen like Tolkien cubes recently, which, just Lord of rings cards plus fall back cards. And that's cool because it's like you're getting a lot of the stuff you like from those draft environments, but it's not quite the same set that you've already drafted. No. It's right. And then, like I say, for me, I think that's a great example of the on ramp into cube. I think building a set cube, especially if it's from a set that kind of like has similar sets. So like for me the best example is like say you built a original in a spread set cube. There's a and it was made up of three on Commons, three Commons got three commentary on Commons one. And I think of every card in that said, there is a good on ramp to expanding that or making that different because there's been so many subsequent in a sets or sets or sets on it that's right. Where okay, I have these three commons, these three cards that are the same, that will be similar effects in other sets I can swap them out with. And then you get a, you go from a set with multiples in it to a set with Singleton in it, because there's enough there. I think that is tricky with something like, with like sets nowadays where, where there's just one block, but like, I do still think it's a good exercise in terms of building a cube because like, say like the Lord of the rings set, especially when and the Lord of the Rings Marvel and Final Fantasy. I think this is still a very good exercise because they all had quite powerful commander cards with them as well. And then there becomes a world of like, well, how much am I changing the draft environment to get these cards in? Because like with like the Lord of the rings cube, for example? People forget to forget the like sucked in that format. And the way to make that better in a set cube is you take cards from the commander product to bump it up. I think, like I see what you're saying in terms of like, it's not like it doesn't have the full complexity of a cube, but cube is daunting. And just like starting off with like this and then like, okay, I'm going to make these choices. That is the stepping stones to being able to make the choice and feel more confident about it in a full, larger environment. So like like like as a first cube, if, if you like listening to us, we appreciate you. If you haven't built a cube, I think a set cube is a perfectly solid and a very good way to start. If there's, there's a that you really like. Yeah, I think that's important as well. Like, like like you have to like the set. You're building it around. Yeah. And I would I would I think you get a lot more of it if it's like you're doing that set plus a little bit, you know, you're making some tweaks. You're getting some cards here and there from. Yeah. Commander products as you say. Or maybe other set sets on the same plane with thematic links, whatever that might be, rather than just reproducing the draft environment on for on essentially. Like, yeah, like another really common one that is, you see like I know Kanagawa Cube say and it's, just all the magic sets sound kind of go, smushed into a cube, and that can work really well. But, the challenge with phase flow is always balancing the old cards with the new cards, because on, on, on straight up power level build cards tend to be quite a lot weaker. Like, well, kind of galaxy. It's actually a for example. Right. Good luck trying to play cards from Old Kanagawa against, Neon Dynasty cards. It might be a bit tricky. But there's a better ways you can address those challenges, right? You can be quite selective with the old cards. You you include and you, you may be the these that absolute best of the, of more modern mods now I can pick. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll put a link down to that. To that set cube video I made a while ago because I like I made it for Lord of the rings, but it will be valid for any other cube out there. All right. Marvelous. I think that's where we're going to leave it today. I think what we've gone over is a good base for any single player base cubes out there. If there's any weakness to let us know down, either in the YouTube comments or come find us on Reddit or Discord, we will do an episode in the future. Then we'll go over everything we've missed. But importantly, we'll also touch on multiplayer. Cuz when we get to that, because I do feel like multiplayer cubes are a whole different base that kind of deserve their own conversation on them. So it's going to do it from my topic. Before we get you out of here, our new returning feature, the Q cube quiz this week called I'm sorry I haven't a cube. That's all I got, I guess. Yeah, yeah, my dad would appreciate that one. All right, all right, James, please pick a color. Let's get that first week, I reckon. Red, I'm going to be nicer to you this week, James. Up in front of me, I have a list of every card from Cube Cobra. I have them listed, ordered by cube count. I would like you to name for me the top five red sorceries by cube count. And if you're listening, dear listener, please put your guesses down in the comments below as well. I want to see how good everyone is. That's so, so surely most of these I get it. Just be like Ben Styles right? So I'm going to lead off with a flame slash. I reckon he's gone. Flame slash he straightened. Flame slash is number four. Flame slash is the fourth most played sorcery in all of cube, with 31,614 nominally starting off hot with a flame slash again. Already beating my pistol. Performance on on blue in China last week. Now, last week you got the first one. You there just then didn't get the rest of it. Just barely tails off very quickly. Yeah yeah yeah okay. So we could still we could still be just as bad as last week. And then I'm going to try. I feel like faithless looting is in so many cubes. I think that's got to be in there. James faces. Looting is in a lot of cubes. Faces. Looting is the most played. Oh, I love, Red sorcery with 88,079. I think this is actually fake. This looting is actually the fourth most played card in all of cube. Oh, wow, that is interesting. I mean, I guess it's a lot. It's a lot. It's powerful. It's. But not too powerful. Very funny. Cube. And it's, it's budget and it goes in, it goes in for for guys and peasant. Right. So that kind of makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. It's literally like the dual Swiss Army knife of I need some red card selection. I'm playing practice looting. Okay. I think going off information for faceless looting is number one. I might try a tormenting voice. Tormenting voice is not there. Too many voices like, is going to be down in the 20s? Tormenting voice is only 13,995. So it's way down, like down stuff. Okay. Now it's just like I want to say Wheel of Fortune, but, I'm conscious that it's also a quite an expensive card dollar wise and people proxy. That's why I'm thinking people just proxy in wheel of Fortune six. So I'm gonna I'm gonna say Wheel of Fortune. You were right to think that Wheel of Fortune is number five. Oh, okay. The fifth most played Red sorcery at 30,796. So you've only got two and three left to go. You're doing very well this week, I must say. Okay. That's cool, that's cool. I'm trying to think of as any. Just like bad removal spells. I've forgotten about that already, I feel it, I feel like most of them are instance, right. Maybe I'm not taking maybe a sweep on, like, anger. I forgot. Can we have an anger? I forgot I do not see anger of the gods in the top fifth. Oh, anger gods. Again? Because I'm doing it from an Excel spreadsheet. It's probably about 25. Okay. It's two below. Tormenting voice. Okay. Not a particularly strong, strong attempt. I have one more guess, I reckon, before you, Oh, you get before you give me some answers. I'm wondering how how spicy are people. Is that, like, a great shot or a, evasive flame and, something, you know, but maybe maybe that's a bit adventurous. The BMV, to be in the top five. I'll tell you, grapeshot is not in the top five. It is above tormenting voice and anger of the gods, which is fine for some of my more pitiful guesses so far. Oh. You know what? I might try, actually, because I feel like it's, there's loads of people again that have it in that sort of utility slot. Can we have a shatter skull smashing? We can. It's in the top 40. I'd say that does not sound. Yeah. As all sound like so 11,089. Yeah. Okay. So I'll give you some clue. So I think you were right with your initial thoughts in terms of what if we're putting a red sorcery in a cube? What does it do? The number three is another card with flashback. Oh, Firebolt. Firebolt is correct. Fireball is number three with 44,077 cards. And then number, number two. Do you want to set it from. Oh, and I'm thinking for some burn spells. I've not said chain lightning yet. It's got to be chain lightning. Chain lightning is number two is number two from legends. Yeah, that's very good. That makes a lot more than just smashing. You can all feel free to shout at me in the comments. In hindsight, yeah, I'd say so. It's a start. Strong. Obviously I say no, no, you got them all now. Well done, well done, well done. What did I call this? This week's episode? Oh, yeah. You, it turns out, James, I'm sorry, you do have a cube. Well done. But not on these. All right, that's where we're going to leave it for today, James. Pleasure, man. Thank you very much. Yeah. Always a pleasure. Marvelous. Do make sure, but, it allows me to thank you all very much for listening. Do make sure you subscribe to the podcast, give us a five star review, tell a friend all that good stuff. I'm pretty positive. Next week will be our cube set review for Reality Fracture. So do make sure you subscribe to check out the episode when it comes out. Until then, it's goodbye from me and James and we'll see you all soon. Goodbye.