Quarantine Cube
(360 Card Cube)
Quarantine Cube
Art by Jesper EjsingArt by Jesper Ejsing
360 Card Cube5 followers
Designed by RedShirtDown
Owned
$3,972
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Mana Pool$3686.11


Welcome to the Quarantine Cube!

Overview

The Quarantine Cube is a powerful unpowered environment, highlighting all the best design mistakes of the past few years. Synergy is key, as most decks will be filled to the brim with spells that delight. Along with having some of the individually most powerful spells outside of the four horseman, this cube also leans on some powerful synergies which when built together should change the texture of the game. The overarching goal of this cube is for my drafters to reach P2P5 and still be happily frustrated with their decision.


Macro-Archetypes


This cube supports the following macro-archetypes easily:
These wbr are your aggressive colors. There are many like them, but these are yours.
The full wurbg support midrange, but that goes without saying. Except I did.
Esper wub holds down the control corner.
And combo is mostly (but not completely) absent in this cube.


Designed Archetypes

These are the archetype I explicitly think of while I'm adding and removing cards. They vary in power level, but I do try to balance with all of them in mind.

White Weenie w

A cube classic. Keeps decks honest, this highly synergistic aggro deck aims to overrun their opponent with an army of small dudes. Use anthems and +1/+1 counters to overpower your foe before they're able to slow you down.

Mono Red r

This is mono red, this is mono red. Another staple. Much like it's cousin from another quadrant, mono red it looking to go face early and often. Unlike weenies, however, they've backed up by the best burn spells printed. This explosive archetype can either lean into its hasty creatures or its plethora of burn spells to count down from 20.

Esper Control wub

A - Always
B - Be
C - Crushing
Remember, fun is zero-sum! Don't let anybody else inn your pod have any. Seriously, this shard does denial really, really well. Let your opponents squirm as you are removing their threats and countering their spells. Remember, you only need 1 win condition and the time to deploy it.

Grixis Spells ubr

Mostly based in blue and red, this archetype is looking to sling powerful spells around to secure the win. This archetype can lean both into tempo or control, so you'll have to pay attention to how your deck is coming together during the draft. Most often it involves having one or two key pieces stick to the board, creating value from every cast.

Mardu Aristocrats wbr

Everybody wants to be a cat! This wedge excels in abusing their little guys for value, often to kill their opponents dead. Use some combination of sacrifice outlets, fodder, and enablers to make every death count.

Bant Tokens wug

This archetype is looking to flood the board with all kinds of tokens to use them for value. Overrun your opponents with creatures, collect a bunch of treasures and clues, or find a way to create your own! This archetype leaves most of the decisions up to you. Just be sure to share your stories with the pod by night's end.

Sultai Cheats ubg

This is less a cohesive archetype, and more a collection of decks trying to accomplish the same goal. Big creatures are fun, and not paying for them even more so! Each of these three archetypes (uTinker, bReanimate, and gPod) are looking to cheat out a big threat early and win from that dominating position. Beware the deck happy to discard their game-ender!

Boros Equipment wr

What's better than a bunch of little guys? A bunch of little guys with swords! This archetype looks to leverage the fact that equipment sticks around to buff all of their troops. Equipment is great, but cheating it into play, or onto creatures is even better!

Azorius Blink wu

A small sub-theme I'm still curating is blink. This archetype is made of creatures with valuable enter the battlefield effects, and spells that allow them to disappear and return. Don't miss the value that recurring a bunch of creatures can accrue.

Persist Combo brg

This is a small but available combo deck if you're lucky enough to pick up its pieces. Utilizing one of the 3 persist creatures (Murderous Redcap, Kitchen Finks, or Woodfall Primus), a sacrifice outlet and something that gives counters on ETB. Sacrifice the creature, it returns from the grave with a -1/-1 counter on it. The +1/+1 counter is given to it, and both counters cancel. Then you are ready to sacrifice it again. Do this until enemy is dead.

Creature Types Matter

This cube began life as a lower powered introduction to cubing and has evolved much since. However, there are still some vestiges of older design philosophies still within. A narrow lane that hopefully is still accessible, if not playable has to do with creature types. I’ve removed most of the lords and anthems, but as I’ve added cards I look for them to have possibly relevant typings.
w really cares for its humans, soldiers, and angels.
ub searches out the faeries.
bu wouldn’t be caught dead without its rogues.
ru puts on it’s robe and wizard hat.


Fun Shoutouts

Below are some cards in the cube, mostly because I enjoy them. You may not have seen them in a while, so this should help familiarize you with lesser-cubed cards.




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