On Christmas morning I finally sat down and got Pauper Cube ported onto Google Docs. Take a look!

Pauper Cube

I’ve made quite a lot of changes from the original list, but very few of them have been on a fundamental level. As I’ve played more and more I’ve been working on cutting cards that require support to be playable. For example, Grave Scrabbler was in the original list as it’s really sweet in the Tortured Existence, but it’s pretty much trash most of time otherwise.

The most major changes that I’ve made have been to the color black. I initially had infect in both green and black, but all of the black creatures with infect just weren’t that impressive. Additionally, drafting a deck completely dedicated to infect in a 540 card Cube is no easy task. None of the black infect creatures passed the test of being good enough as singular cards, so they were pretty easy to cut. This freed up some spaces for the cards that would be good in a very aggressive black deck, which is a deck that hasn’t been popular thus far. I’m the only person that has yet drafted a red/black aggressive deck and I have only done so once. I did manage to 4-1(because best of seven is the only way to play) QuietSpeculation’s own Tyler Tyssedal (self-confessed Ryan Overturf kryptonite) though, so interpret that as you will.

I can’t say enough good things about my experience with Pauper Cube thus far. I’ve seen a lot of MODO-photos with regard to Holiday Cube recently, and I know that a lot of people enjoy Powered Cube, but for my money I’d play a grindy attrition match over two turn games any day of the week. If you’re into opening packs where some cards are Goblin Guide and others are Ancestral Recall then more power to you. I’m personally more into a much tighter power band.

Speaking of attrition and tight things, check out this four color deck I Winstoned the other day:

Having Mnemonic Wall, Peel from Reality and Remember the Fallen is pretty insane. Mnemonic Wall and Remember the Fallen are two of the most powerful cards in the Cube, which I think is really awesome.

As of now there are very few cards that I think might be too powerful for the Cube. For the most part I only have my eye on Maul Splicer and Seraph Angel. Both are very capable of single-handedly winning games if unanswered. They haven’t been cut yet as I feel like the answers to them are sufficient, but I’ve definitely seen games where Seraph Angel was pretty close to unbeatable.

As of yet nobody has played Temporal Fissure for more than two copies but Grapeshot and Empty the Warrens have both stormed for five. The cards don’t always show up but I’ve had a lot of decks that would have been very capable of abusing any of the Storm cards, which is where I believe I want the deck to be. Every time Empty the Warrens shows up somebody should be able to consistently cast it for 3+ copies.

That’s all I really have for this week. That spreadsheet took a pretty decent chunk of time and I feel that much of the list speaks for itself. That said I’m more than happy to answer any questions and entertain any suggestions. Know any cool commons that I missed? Let me know!

-Ryan Overturf
@RyanOverdrive on Twitter