Greetings fellow Cubers and welcome back to Unboxed: the weekly article series that shines a spotlight on themes and topics about the best format in Magic: The Gathering! Thank you to everyone who has supported the series and if there is a topic or theme you would like covered, leave your thoughts in the comments below! With that said: Let’s get Cubing!
One of the main parts of Cube I have not written much on yet are the ten dual-colored sections that cubes of all shapes, sizes, and power levels have access to. While I wish that all of the guilds were able to truly call themselves equals, my own experiences have demonstrated that certain guilds have access to substantially stronger cards and themes than others. The newest two-part article series will evaluate how each of the guilds have fared in 2020 in terms of newer or older themes that have been given reinforcements or individual cards released this year that have proven to make a difference. This look at the ten two-color pairs will updated each year after all of the new releases for the year have come out. This two-part article will shine a spotlight on the ten two color guilds and how the 2020 releases impacted their themes and raw power.
Important Notes:- Since all of these cards and archetypes have some amount of subjectivity to them, there are no rankings of the individual cards, but the guilds as a whole will be evaluated exclusively based on their gold cards.
- There may be archetypes or themes missing, but the ones mentioned in this article are more prevalent at higher levels of cube play. For Pauper/Peasant players, there may be themes and archetypes that may have more support or ones you just like better. Form your guild sections how you want to!
- I have plenty of noteworthy cards mentioned in this article, but this is by no means all of them or a guide of any kind. It is your Cube, so build it the way you want to!
Azorius has had access to some of the most powerful multi-color cards when looking back at past years and archetypes. The 2020 releases, while not much in the way of archetype pushes, introduced more powerful creature options from Dream Trawler to Linvala along with reliable non-creature spells, such as Lawmage’s Binding. Azorius has a solid theme of supporting creatures with flying, as it once again did in Commander Legends, and numerous cards that support the blink archetype, which plans to take advantage of powerful enters the battlefield triggers multiple times as the game progresses. While there were several cards that somewhat support these two themes to come out this year, Yorion’s ability to mass-blink your permanents is quite powerful and that does not even take the companion aspect nor its excellent stats into account. While Azorius may not have gotten a ton of help this year, it is still one of the best guilds around and has a plethora of directions and options to choose from when tinkering with this section.
Dimir is another guild, like Azorius, where it has had access to some of the most powerful multi-color cards when looking back at past years and while its archetypes may not be quite as defined, the quality of individual Dimir cards is incredible. The 2020 releases centered around the main themes of the Dimir guild, including cards centered around the graveyard, cards that steal your opponent’s cards for you to use against them, and powerful standalone cards that can fit in a cube of any play style. Araumi and Obsessive Stitcher are great examples of using the graveyard as an additional resource as the game plays out and Atris is another exciting card that can give you access to a Fact or Fiction-esque effect on an efficient creature. It is a testament to the power level of Dimir cards that Ashiok, Nightmare Muse is one of the best gold cards to be released in 2020 and it does not even see that much play in many higher power level cubes. Dimir may not have the most well-defined archetypes, but the standalone quality of its cards is so high that it usually does not even matter.
Unlike Dimir, Rakdos has one of the most well-defined themes out of all ten guilds in sacrificing a bunch of your creatures for additional effects after you have attacked or used them in other ways. The 2020 releases did plenty to further reinforce this through Juri and Dire Fleet Warmonger being excellent examples of the sacrifice outlets and payoffs you need to make your deck truly work. Kroxa also does this by automatically sacrificing himself for free if you did not pay his escape cost and in this strategy, he is generating value for you whether he sticks around on the board or not. While Rakdos does not have that many standalone cards that are inherently powerful, Kroxa and Zagras are hopeful signs that more of these cards are coming soon. Rakdos has an excellent sacrifice package bolstered by this year’s cards and solid removal spells, but it lacks the standalone cards many of the other guilds have and I feel one or two more strong cards are needed to bring this guild up to par with some of the others.
If Rakdos has a well-supported theme and is missing the individual cards to truly make it great, Gruul is in the exact opposite situation. The 2020 releases did not do much to create or expand upon a truly viable theme or archetype for Gruul. Wizards has tried the four power or more theme several times, but I have not seen it truly take hold in many cubes thus far. All four cards shown above are excellent to solid standalone cards that elevate any Gruul deck, but there is no clear direction for this guild, other than playing some aggro/midrange threats or good planeswalkers and hope your opponent does not have answers. Phylath is a cool take on Avenger of Zendikar and Radha has been doing some solid work since I have included her in my list, but this guild needs more focus and not more cards that are just individually good. Gruul got some okay cards this year, but without a clear sense of direction, it feels more like you would play a green based deck for burn spells or a red aggro deck with some green midrange at the top of the curve.
While some of the guilds previously mentioned are in great shape and others need some help, Selesnya is in somewhat of an odd place. The 2020 releases were pretty good to Selesnya as Frondland Felidar and Yasharn both provide decent midrange options and Conclave Mentor along with Hamza reinforce the classic +1/+1 counters theme that this guild had championed for years. While Selesnya has strong +1/+1 counters and tokens themes, none of the card within those groups have truly elevated themselves to be exceptional. Selesnya does not have the crazy cards that Azorius and Dimir do, but it also does not lack the things that Rakdos and Gruul are seeking. This guild is in a very balanced state in that its themes and cards are good, but they are not quite good enough to compete with the best versions of some of the other guilds. Perhaps even one standalone card that reinforces one of Selesnya’s archetypes can really start to elevate it into the upper echelon of guilds.
Story Time of the Week (My overall thoughts on the Five Allied Guilds): I think that of the five guilds mentioned in Part 1, I would say that Azorius is in excellent shape both in card quality and archetype support, which would result in me having a very high opinion of it. Dimir does not have well defined themes, but the individual cards are so strong that it almost makes up for that fact entirely and unless there is a push to make this guild even more focused on the graveyard or stealing resources from your opponent, I think Dimir is in good shape. Rakdos and Gruul have mirroring problems in that Rakdos is missing the high-power cards that Dimir has while Gruul is missing the themes and archetypes that Azorius has. I think both guilds need some help going forward and will hopefully produce more cards and themes to make me more excited to play these color combinations. Selesnya is probably the fairest guild of them all in that it has excellent themes and very solid cards, but the options provided get outclassed by other guilds in one way or another. If Rakdos and Gruul need strong support to bring them up to the levels of Azorius and Dimir, Selesnya needs a very slight push.
And that is the list for this week! I hope you enjoyed a look at the five allied guilds and how they fared in 2020. I am always excited for gold cards whenever they appear because they can really push the power levels of the guilds. My ultimate hope is that all ten of the guilds will truly have equal standing one day and each card closer to that goal always puts a smile on my face.
Join me next week for Part 2 with a look at the enemy color guilds and until then, may you pick the gold card that will bring you plenty of fun!
Special thanks to Cube Cobra for letting me contribute to the best Cube resource around, Gary Thompson for compiling the bulk of the data used for this article, and Maegan for being the best editor a writer can ask for!
