Cube Advancement

Limited forum

Posted on July 5, 2015, 5:14 p.m. by buildingadeck

I have constructed a cube using only cards from the plane of Ravnica. This creates a wide power range in the cards, but it also allows for continuity in mechanics between cards that makes it pretty easy to draft.

After playing 16 drafts against bots on the tappedout playtester and constructing each of the decks, I played 16 draft tournaments and have found a few decks to be the standouts: Mardu Midrange, Abzan Tokens, Jund Midrange, and Jeskai Control, each winning at least 3 tournaments a piece.

The cube is relatively low on creatures because I wanted there to be a lot of interaction between players outside of combat. I tend to be a control-style player, so that attribute most likely affected the way I constructed the cube. Decks usually have about 12-17 creatures, 17 being at the higher end of the spectrum, unlike many cubes.

I have a few quandaries from more experienced cube drafters/builders who might know. First, is it too narrow a scope of play with only four major deck types (at least, that I've seen; granted, I'm most likely biased toward them at this point)? Also, I have been wanting to find a replacement for Blood Funnel for a while, but there is no other rare enchantment from Ravnica: City of Guilds. I thought about putting in Necroplasm, but I feel like that really overpowers black, a color common to 3 of the four major decks. Likewise, the Sphere of Safety deck hasn't quite risen to power, so is swapping Primeval Light with Predatory Focus?

Obviously, most of these questions can't be answered without properly drafting the cube, but drafting against bots is a rather ineffective way for me to test... They make a lot of questionable decisions. If any of you have time, it would be a great help to me if you could draft this online with friends and comment what you liked and didn't like as well as what you noted to be significant archetypes of the cube.

For those who do respond, I thank you in advance because I don't want to go out and buy a bunch of cards to have my playgroup hate the cube. Thanks, again!

Here is the cube link.