The Cobalt Cube
(450 Card Cube)
The Cobalt Cube
Cube ID
Art by Jason ChanArt by Jason Chan
450 Card Peasant Legacy Cube0 followers
Designed by fizzbark
Owned
$603
Buy
$187
Purchase
Mana Pool$464.60
Overview

A flat power cube that focuses on fun drafts and rewards synergy. Legacy legality, but closer to Modern power levels.

Archetypes w-u Azorius Now you see me, now you don't, now you see me again.

Bounce, flicker, and blink enter effects to turn incremental into overwhelming advantage,

b-u Dimir Who Let The Dogs Out (Of The (Grave)Yard)

Use discard effects to put your biggest creatures in the graveyard, then bring them to the battlefield for less than they cost to cast.

b-r Rakdos Asylum Aggro

Unleash a horde of aggressive creatures using Madness costs to turn discard effects into card advantage.

r-g Gruul Face Punchers

Haste, trample, and big bodies.

w-g Selesnya Polygamous Wedding Invite

More +1s than you thought was possible.

b-w Orzhov Nosferatu's Bottomless Brunch

Outlast your opponent by gaining life. Draw cards and make your creature's bigger as a tasty side-effect.

r-u Izzet Spellslinger

Play lots of spells, draw lots of cards.

b-g Golgari Stomp the Yard

Fill up your graveyard for discounted mana costs and stat buffs.

r-w Boros Knife Enthusiast Social Club

Little guy? Not very scary. Little guy with a sword? Somewhat concerning. Lots of little guys packing axes, bolas, and a mortar? Fuck yeah.

u-g Simic Haymakers

Play a bit of ramp, a bit of card draw, and fill the rest of your deck with expensive threats.

Splashing

Most of these decks have opportunities to splash cards in a third color, keep an eye out for synergies outside of the colour pair.

Other Decks

There's a range of other decks, although they may be harder to consistently draft than those above and work better as sub-themes that require a backup plan. Look out for Mill, Toughness matters, and 5 colour archetypes.

Design Notes Aesthetics Varied Visuals

This cube is a chance to showcase cards from a range of sets with a range of art styles. The most visually striking and unique versions have been chosen where possible.

Combos

While there are some very powerful synergies, the cube has no known infinite combos.

Universes Beyond

MtG as a game has evolved and changed a lot and I've made the cube reflect that. Some recent settings I've included don't feel like the magic of old, but the cards I've chosen from them have a timeless design once you look beyond the art and flavour. I'll continue to draw this line in arbitrary places as I see fit - if the vibes are off, it better add something great to gameplay.

Fiddliness Reminder Text

Unusual and rarely used keywords have reminder text written on the card.

Banned Mechanics

Enter the Dungeon, The Ring Tempts You, Monarch, and other mechanics that require an additional card to understand are excluded from the cube.

Restricted Mechanics

Mechanics that are moderately complicated or unusual are not added to the cube unless there will multiple examples of the mechanic in the cube. Excluded examples are Day/Night and Incubate, included examples are Ninjitsu and Backup.

Double Faced Cards and Split cards.

Double faced cards are reduced in numbers to speed up the draft - one of each color + a multicolor + a colorless. Split cards have been excluded entirely as they are hard to read without turning sideways - often telegraphing to an observant opponent. A single battle has been included on a trial basis.

Shuffling

Tutors and cards that require additional deck shuffling are kept to a minimum.

Counters

Counter types such as Oil have been excluded from the cube as they can cause confusing situations when in the same set as +1/+1 and -1/-1 counters. tracking game states should be easily doable with only a set of d6s and the cubes tokens.

Tokens

There are far too many unique tokens in the cube. I'd like to reduce the numbers but good cards designs keep coming along and interfering.

Power Median Card

The baseline for the set is Vampire Nighthawk. This is a card that is always a solid reliable pick for any black deck, but an archetype specific card will usually make a better choice.

Mana Bases

Although aggro decks are decent, the goal of gameplay is to match the speed of modern limited formats. While breaking pauper limits by adding rare dual lands is a popular choice in other cubes, I have found a slightly slower environment allows for more janky weird decks to be viable. Having a median spell cost closer to 3 than 2 allows for more decks to get a chance to 'do their thing'.

Exclusions

Several cards have been excluded due to being too powerful for the environment. These cards are common choices to exclude in popular Pauper cubes:
Sprout Swarm
Sol Ring
Skullclamp
Grafted Wargear
Loxodon Warhammer
Mother of Runes

White Pie Tweak

Swords to Plowshares, Path to Exile, and Condemn have been excluded from the cube as one mana instant speed exile is not something that white gets access to in modern magic. This kind of removal is more efficient than anything else in the environment and can make even 4cmc creatures feel too clunky to play.

Strong First Picks

Not sure what to draft? These cards are strong and versatile enough to go in almost any deck you draft.

w White

u Blue

b Black

r Red

g Green

Final Fantasy Update

A lot of words on these cards, but most of them lead to interesting play patterns. Also cleaned out some hybrids that aren't meeting the intended utility goals.

WHITE Rescue Chwinga > Sunpearl Kirin

Flying over a point of toughness is more or less a strict upgrade.

Resolute Reinforcements > Battle Menu

Serves the same role as a two drop with flash, while acting as a removal spell as well. The lifegain and combat trick modes won't get played much but they do both serve niche archetypes in the cube.

Splitskin Doll > Zack Fair

White decks pretty much never want the discard and always just get a draw so the doll just isn't very interesting in this environment. Zack does bodyguard stuff and the counters and equipment tricks serve as niche but interesting additions.

Lionheart Glimmer > Summon: Primal Garuda

All the summons seem to play better on defence than offence, Garuda most of all. It has a particular potential to swing losing races into winning ones that I like - removing a creature then pumping the team for two turns while being another temporary body should be a Moment.
Glimmer does the same thing but in a much more lackluster way that leads to slower games.

BLUE Jetting Glasskite > Plumecreed Escort

Theres more than enough finisher options for a control deck and Glasskite is one of the most frustrating to play against, like Glimmer above it tends to gum up boards rather than resolve games. Plumecreed is also annoying, but only temporarily.

Whirlwind Denial > Spectral Denial

Whirlwind is too expensive for what it does. Spectral is perfectly okay in most blue decks, and really shines in Temur big aggro stuff when a board state needs protecting.

> Summon Shiva

Shiva does a similar job to Behold the Unspeakable - it stops attacks for a turn and draws cards. It can also be used offensively or in a way, modally - the decision space between trading off the saga on two or holding on for the third chapter value should be interesting.

BLACK Merciless Executioner > Sheoldred's Edict

The ability to remove planeswalkers is nice here as well as a Murmuring Mystic or Young Pyromancer that's already made some tokens.

> Shefet Archfiend

Another good reanimate target, this one provides a little value with the ETB at least.

> Rotten Reunion

Some counterplay to yard strats that doesn't completely hose them, it might see a home in aristocrats or spellslinger as well due to the handy flashback.

> Fang, Fearless l'Cie

This half is mostly in here to let players live the meld dream. There's enough targets though to get value off the ability at least once in a grindy Golgari build.

RED Gut, True Soul Zealot > Origin of the Hidden Ones

The tokens Gut makes are just too hard to deal with - menace + 4 power means there's no way to block them without losing at least a creature and the damage coming in is too high to ignore for long. The fact that Gut doesn't have to get in danger to make them really puts this card over the top and it's a remove or lose. Origin is an option for red control decks - a potential 4 menace creatures will be a headache in some matchups.

Valduk, Keeper of the Flame > Queen Brahne

Another army in a can, Valduk requires a bit too much work to get value, at which point he becomes a liability with all the resources going into one tempting rremoval target.
Queen Brahne is a Gut/Valduk that makes worse tokens and has to put herself in danger to get value. Prowess can be deceptively powerful on understatted creatures - optimistic this card finds a home in spellslinger.

Furnace Reins > Pinnacle Monk

Reins is a bit narrow and gets picked very late. Monk being an MDFC means its always a tempting pick, even for creature heavy decks.

GREEN > Strangleroot Geist

Undying is a bit of a nonbo at times with +1 decks, but it's also very good the rest of the time. A hasty beater that might push some more aggressive green decks.

Overprotect > Mutagenic Growth

0 mana is better than 2 mana and growth can be played by non-green decks too.

Satyr Wayfinder > Malevolent Rumble

Arguably a sidegrade, but rumble hitting any permanent makes it far more flexible.

Garruk's Packleader > Great Oak Guardian

For the most part green decks at 5+ mana don't want to draw things out, they want to end the game. The tree having flash helps catch out players and close games.

Poison Dart Frog > Torgal, A Fine Hound

The utility of the frog as a blocker is a bit undercut by needing to hold up mana with it as a threat. Most decks that want a mana dork, also want to use that mana to cast creatures in the maon. Torgal is the only dog/wolf currently in the cube, but still provides value on his own.

Squirrel Nest > Diamond Weapon

Nest is a bit slow and generally encourages long games of chumping from decks that can't always capitalize on the long game and just delay the inevitable. Weapon might also turn into a wall in some games, but graveyard decks are in a much better position usually to take advantage of a long grindy game.

Path to the World Tree > Vanille, Cheerful l'Cie

An eternal witness that mills plays well on it's own and the body is fair for the rate. Melding into Ragnarok is the dream here and replaces Path to the World Tree's 5 color 'Achievement' with it's own for the sort of player that seeks to do the thing. Ragnarok itself is very powerful and has a much better chance than Path of leading to a won game.

Multicoloured Gandalf's Sanction > The Emperor of Palmecia

Sanction is awkward early game, and often not the late game finisher you hope for. Emperor might not play that well but is a fine rate, and could lead to big moments if flipped.

Bladehold War-Whip > Zidane, Tantalus Thief

Moving away from Boros as an equipment focus so whip is the natural next cut. Zidane provides big swings in races, and incentivizes a splash from Rakdos and Orzhov aristocrats decks, or Azorious blink decks.

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