Kaladesh Cube Preview Part 2/3
In part two of this look at Kaladesh from a cube perspective, we will focus on the cards I will be testing out. These are all potentially very powerful and useful cards. While they may not all survive in the cube they will no doubt be strong constructed cards at some stage. The cube demands some quite specific things from cards. It is usually not for power reasons that cards don’t make it. Instead it is lack of archetypal homes or the existence of cards that do the same job a bit better. That or the card simply requires a bit too much support to fully yield it’s full potential. A card like Collected Company is a card just like that I tested out in cube. I knew it was incredibly powerful but also felt it was a little too narrow in how you can build with it for it to see enough play. It did not last in cube but it has still dominated standard. Those are the sorts of card we have here and these are my thoughts on them. There are a lot of them, as there were with the auto include cards, further indicating the strength of Kaladesh
I am fairly certain this will become a cube mainstay. The only reason it is here in the cards I need to test is that it will be weaker than both Raise the Alarm and Gather the Townsfolk in cube. This has no fateful hour, it is sorcery speed, it does not make humans and most importantly of all it does not make white creatures. This is still likely one of the best two drops you can make in a tokens deck and there are plenty of non Crusade style effects that will pump the little servos! For constructed play this has far more useful synergies going on with artifacts and could well be a standard staple should the appropriate deck fit the meta.
This is probably the card after Servo Exhibition I most expect to become a cube mainstay. A 3/1 for 2 is a decent set of aggressive stats and this comes with a bonus scry for 2! This is by far and away the best proactive tempo play you can make that also yields card quality. In cube the vehicle pump will only come up very infrequently and be fairly minor when it does. For standard the vehicle pump should be far more relevant. The only concern I have for this card is that it only goes in one deck (Boros aggro) and that deck has huge amounts of redundancy in cube. It is also not a better deck than white weenie or red deck wins. As a mono coloured card this would be straight in the cube. Being both gold and narrow this has a slightly higher bar to reach than other cards.
Three mana planeswalkers are hard to ignore. They have almost all been good cards in the cube. As a card type that build up power and gain incremental advantages the effect of having them in play sooner is highly significant. My reservations towards Saheeli in cube are down to three factors. The first is that Dack Fayden is rather in the way and rather more rounded and potent. Most of the places I might want something like Saheeli I would want a Dack Fayden more. The second problem with Saheeli is that she doesn’t protect herself. This is less of an issue for the there mana walkers than the others but is still a bit of a downer. Lastly Saheeli is a little situational if you want to get the full range and value from her minus loyalty abilities. She ideally wants certain board states or the right kind of artifacts to work with. In a powered cube with access to Black Lotus I think Saheeli gains enough synergy and early game power than she is well worth including. In my more midrange cube we shall have to see.
This is a very rounded six drop than unlike almost all others does compete fairly well with Grave Titan. A lot of this is down to the Demon of Dark Schemes having very different functionality to the Grave Titan and working well in different situations. Mostly this is a 5/5 flier that deals with all the small creatures in play. That makes it quite a high impact play right away which is important in expensive cards. Due to the energy mechanic it has the Demon also has some good ongoing value. It is like a Massacre Wurm and an Ink Eyes, Servant of Oni rolled into one. The Demon is a bit more situational than Grave Titan but it does a range of useful things rather than just being immense board presence. The utility of the Demon gives it a good chance of getting some cube love. It is even a card you could use in a Reanimate deck fairly effectively.
As vehicles are a fully new mechanic to the game I am unsure of how it will play out. It seems good but without testing that is just guesswork. Although I don’t know exactly how vehicles will play out in the cube I know that this is one of the best vehicles on offer. Skysovereign, Consul Flagship is the very top end of the vehicles you would want to play in cube. In a mildly comparable way to equipment, the bigger and more powerful you go with them, the more risk you are exposing yourself to. The Flagship mitigates much of that risk with an immediate Lightning Bolt to anything but face. Crew 3 is a not at all an insignificant cost and will not always be met however you get to attack with a flying Inferno Titan when you can which is always pretty game breaking! While a lot to get online it is an incredibly good return of power for your investment. Flagship does several very good things for you and that versatility is the hallmark of a good top end cube card. It is threat diversity that allows you to evade sorcery speed creature kill. It is an ongoing source of creature and planeswalker control which is not only powerful in it’s own right but also something a couple of colours have no access to. The Flagship is also a large flier itself which combined with the Lightning Bolt gives you very solid board control as well as a dangerous threat. Essentially if this lives and you can use it you shouldn’t die and they should fairly soon. I can see green ramp decks loving this as it plugs so many of the holes in the deck in one neat powerful package. I give this a pretty good chance of staying in the cube.
Having started on the vehicles I may as well do all those that I intend to test or think could be cube worthy. The Sky Skiff is the lowest powered of the vehicles and is strictly worse than the Smuggler’s Copter. Despite that, it is still potentially viable if vehicles perform well. It is just a cheap and effective little tool than any deck containing creatures can use to make their plays and combat more efficient. It will always be sad playing this when you could have a Copter but that doesn’t stop it from being a card that is good enough. There are plenty of cards in the cube that are directly worse than others. Smuggler’s Copter is certainly a card that is powerful enough that something this much less of a card is still plenty good!
This is the other common vehicle that seems viable for cube. It is cheap to play and packs a lot of punch. While only really something you want for the more aggressive decks this is still cheap enough to remain an option for any of them. Wrath proof threats, evasion and tempo are what they want and this brings all of them. If you are an aggressive deck then crew 2 will be very easy to do with almost all your cards having that power or more. Not quite as rounded as Sky Skiff but you do get rather more for your mana with the train!
This is very hard hitting and does so right away with no board at all making it one of the most proactive and convenient vehicles. Five power for four mana with haste is a big deal and compares well with some of the other top rate aggressive four drops in cube. My reservations over this vehicle are that it is a little to easy to kill in combat for the amount you invest in the card. I feel like the one mana lower cost on the Renegade Freighter makes it a better fit for the cube. It’s convenience will likely make it a better constructed vehicle than the train. Of the vehicles I plan to test this is the one I have lowest expectations for in the cube but I feel it may be one of the more relevant ones outside of cube, particularly in standard.
This is the last vehicle I plan to test in the cube. In a midrange cube I think this has enough power and utility to be a decent inclusion in a selection of archetypes. Three is a lot to pay for a single ramp card however the Cultivator’s Caravan is also somewhat of a 5/5 when you need it to be. The key difference between this and cards like a Keyrune is that this costs no mana to turn into a threat. As such it is a really potent midrange tempo play. Either it is a very efficient monster for the cost or it is helping you further develop your board. Both options on how to use this card in a given turn are strong and useful. Something like a Keyrune is only worth making into a creature when you have nothing useful in hand. The Caravan can also tap for mana the turn you make it giving you the ability to have it in play for an investment of only two mana on that turn. All the good artifact ramp cards also do this but none of them can also become a 5/5 for no mana. Crew three is actually fairly onerous. Crew is not such a linear progression as it looks. Crew 3 is over three times more awkward to do than crew one. It is probably twice as hard as crew 2. It is the combination of being a very convenient mana source with the option of being a significant body that make this exciting. If you are playing it and using it primarily in a single capacity then there is a better card for you somewhere else in the cube. It if for these same reasons I am not even bothering to test out the Bomat Bazaar Barge. It is only a vehicle with crew three and so you can only use it in that capacity which makes it cumbersome.
I think this is the second best of the Gearhulk cycle for the cube and has reasonably good expectations for it in testing. While not a reliable removal card, this is still a really good value play that can afford massive swings in the game. Worst case this is a 4/5 vigilance for five. Not good value at that but a pretty relevant body none the less. If you are using it like this it implies you opponent doesn’t have much themselves going on. Best case scenario this decimates their board and leaves them with a couple of fairly low impact cards. Cataclysmic Gearhulk really punishes decks with heavy focus, any over extension and also most stalemate situations. It is a good midrange and control tool that is pretty good against midrange and most aggro decks. It is not an awkward card in the same way Tragic Arrogance and Cataclysm are because you are also getting the 4/5 along with it. It should be very easy to play so as to not harm yourself in any real way with the ability and as such it is a pretty safe card with a lot of potential.
One of the narrower Gearhulk cards that has a shot in the cube due to some good synergies with artifact recursion in red. Goblin Welder is a potent card and goes hand in hand with this Gearhulk. Although giving your opponent options isn’t usually a strong way to go there are pretty savage consequences for either option if you get to trigger this multiple times. There is also the very real possibility in some cube decks that this will be able to one shot people, certainly it is something you can setup should you wish. This makes the choice a whole lot more uncomfortable for your opponent. This will not see cube play as a midrange card simply because Inferno Titan is so mentally strong. As part of a red artifact ramp and Welder deck this is a lot more interesting. A 6/6 first strike is also pretty decent, not a lot is stopping it or getting past it or racing it should that be the way you need to use your Gearhulk.
While this is super powerful and good value I am a touch concerned how expensive it is for cube. Most of the things you can recur with this cost around two mana. You are still getting a great deal on tempo at that but you are not abusing the card. This is the kind of thing that is a convenience play but it is also a six drop. The body may well do some good work in combat, especially with the flash, and get you a three for one. The issue is it will be often too late to be relevant or so blatantly obvious it can be played around. Most blue targets are countermagic and countermagic at six mana is really hard to use. The way in which this functions is a little awkward, however it is just so much power and value that it could easily become a cube mainstay.
My expectations for this one are low, especially with so few other energy cards being cube worthy. Despite this I feel compelled to test this out. It is an absurd amount of stats for the mana one once you have attacked and paid your energy. A 1/4 isn’t a big deal but River Kajinn is a 3 drop! Shave two mana off most bad cards and they become bombs. This Turtle is really hard to remove, it blocks most things very well and might well just be good enough at that. If you want bodies to equip or provide devotion or just use for Opposition then this one is the right cost and really good value. This is certainly a pretty terrifying standard and limited card. In the right deck this is the best Slith ever printed.
The reason this is a test card and not an auto include is that it is quite polar in its performances. In some matchups it will do very little while in others it will be completely back breaking. I try to avoid direct hosers and cards that are best in sideboards in my drafting cube. I also try and keep gold cards to a minimum and as broad as possible. This card has an uphill battle ahead of it! While I might avoid cards like this for the cube and demand a bit more of them before I accept them into the ranks that has no bearing on how good this is in other places. Anything that stands out as a cube sideboard card is likely to see constructed play somewhere or other. Decks reliant on spells will hate this, decks also light on removal will lose to this.
This is one of the best combat tricks ever printed yet it still has work to do to earn a cube place. Combat tricks are incredibly powerful but they are also situational. The kind of deck that want to run these huge tempo blowout cards are not the kind of deck that can afford situational cards. All the best cube combat tricks are also a card that does something else as well. The cube is moving towards a creature heavier more combat orientated game and as such combat tricks are gaining strength. This is a nice cheap card that gives enough of a stats boost to alter the outcome of most blocks in your favour. It is also a counterspell against targetted removal thus making it dual purpose. Countering removal is still a fairly narrow effect and so the low cost of this card needs to carry it somewhat. Vines of Vastwood was decent in cube but at double green to pump anything it was just too awkward to get good tempo out of the stats boost. I am fairly hopeful this will offer enough to merit a cube slot.
A really nicely designed card with a great top end potential. Essentially this is a Raging Goblin that can reserve you a card from your deck each time it attacks until you eventually cash it in and swap your hand for the things it reserved throughout the game. While Bomat Courier does have some exciting top end outcomes (two mana for seven damage and seven new cards sounds delicious but also a complete fantasy) it is not something you should count on. It also can technically cycle itself away easily, you just need nothing in hand you care about when you do it! I think this has some chance in really quick decks that empty their hands quickly. Potentially in decks eager to discard things and also potentially in decks with a strong artifact theme. I fear this will be too much like a Raging Goblin to get anything useful done for the more standard cube decks.
This is not one I expect to stand the test of time given that Despise didn’t last. This is the far better turn one play than Despise as it is usually cheap creatures that are the most important thing to deal with. Having a free scry on top of that is massive, but the card is narrow. This will be a top standard card. With the prevalence of creature decks in standard this is likely maindeck worthy but at the very least it is a solid sideboard option. For cube there are still too many decks with too few targets for this to be super. Playable but also liable to miss. Missing is less bad with this than other one mana discard spells but still, you are not happy paying a card and a mana for a scry and a look at their hand. As black gets more options on ways to filter cards such as Collective Brutality narrow but powerful cards like Harsh Scrutiny will improve.
This is a Lumengrid Warden with the ability to scry for you. It is relatively low power and impact however it is cheap, convenient and does most of what you want from a speed bump card. This could see play in the same sort of role as Wall of Omens. A 1/3 is a lot more use than a 0/4 but then drawing a card makes it far less of a cost. Three scrys is not far off the value of a card but it means Aether Theorist is a real cost to play. You have to be pretty confident that you can exchange card numbers for quality and be in a better position. Either than or you have to have some actual uses for the 1/3 body beyond it getting in the way a bit. It is a bit too defensive on the stat distribution to be the kind of thing you include so that you have more bodies to equip. As the scry effect needs you to tap the Theorist he is ideally suited to sitting back, blocking and scrying at the end of their turn. This is the sort of card that suits the cube well, good cheap rounded support. My concern is that the kind of decks that might want this will not be up for losing a card to do so.
This is one of the best card designs I have seen and it makes me biased towards wanting to include it! In reality this is a little narrow and unreliable but it is exactly the kind of tool I want to see a lot more of. This is a cheap red card with options. Either it is a potentially powerful removal spell or it cycles. It does the cycling it a pretty awkward way but it gives you the option on being removal first. You don’t have to exile things you don’t want to if you can play them instead. There are a couple of places I can see this having some potential but it is a little tenuous. The main red archetype red deck wins will not touch this. It has a very low average CMC, little control over the top of the library and wants to be able to aim burn at peoples faces. Where this might shine is in Izzet prowess decks. The ability to have a card neutral single red mana prowess trigger is nice, as is the option on having a hefty spot removal card. Izzet prowess decks have some control over the top of their deck and some high CMC cards like Treasure Cruise it can hit. You might be able to run this in Counterbalance decks simply because they have so much control over the top of their deck making this card reliable and versatile. Lastly some kind of big red deck could use this as it is always keen to find good ways to thin the deck and has some high CMC things it can hit.
There are a lot of comparisons you can draw between this and Brainstorm. Both see three new cards, both dispose of two cards and both are overall card neutral. Brainstorm is so significantly the most powerful card quality spell that being comparable to it is a pretty big deal. Cathartic Reunion is a lot riskier and slower than the mighty Brainstorm but that does not rule it out. There are occasions Reunion in actually better! Brainstorm needs further help to fully get rid of the things you put back while Reunion does this automatically. Reunion is also a discard outlet which has a significant range of utility in magic. Reunion is weaker card quality than Brainstorm as you have to discard the two before you see the new three but it is still a very powerful card quality effect, especially outside of blue. The two things that may hold this back as a cube card are the results of needing the discard as an addition to the cost. If you get this counterspelled you have pretty much lost. It is about as bad as having your Brainstorm Plagiarized but far far more likely. The other smaller issue is that you do need to have two cards in hand before you can play this which can make it a weak top deck in the late game. Lots of risk for lots and lots of reward.
This is quite an odd card. It is three two mana spells rolled into a Charm style card where you can choose any one of the three modes; Counterspell, Twincast and Redirect. The reason Insidious Will is odd is that it doubles the cost of any one of the single cards yet remains a playable card. There is no way that would cut it for most combinations of cube worthy two drops. Four mana is just too much to pay for a two mana card! Two drops are good because of their cost relative to their effect never purely based on their effect alone. Three mana counterspells are a bit too pricey in cube… The reason this is a potential contender is that Counterspell is a very broadly useful effect that prevents the card being a dead one most of the time combined with the fact that Redirect can be utterly game breaking. Redirect is one of the most powerful effects in magic but it is balanced by being super situational and this is why it can be cost at just two. You can almost never include such effects in your deck because you have to have them at the perfect time. A good Redirect is far more powerful than a good Cryptic Command, it is closer to a good Treachery in power level. This card lets you have the option on that super game breaking power while not exposing you to the risk of a dead spell.
In the final part of this cube set review we will look at the interesting cards that are too niche to go into a drafting cube but otherwise offer unique or powerful effects that merit keeping an eye on them. Either they will crop up as useful cards in other formats or they will print something else that suddenly makes them cube worthy. If like me, you do open formats like rotisserie with your cube then some of these narrower cards are also strong and useful things to have access to for the more exotic decks.
