Testing Metastatic Evangel - Does not do anything upon ETB and does not trigger on tokens. I think this will end up being impactful enough, but I can see it getting replaced. Serum Visionary - A lot of other cards can fit in this slot, testing it over Sea Gate Oracle. Glimpse the Impossible - A lot of words that support a range of archetypes. The question will be how often it works they you want it to. Writhing Chrysalis - This card is really pushed, but does not really support a signpost. I usually want a little more from the guild slot.
Unless the next nonland card is 2 mana or less, you lose it forever. If it's a 3-drop or more, it stays in exile and all you have is a 2/1 first strike plus two energy you may have no other use for. Unlike cascade, which keeps going until it finds a suitable card, this stops dead on the next nonland, regardless of whether you can cast it or not.
I did 3-0 in my cube with mono red and Amped Raptor has been crazy. Taking into account almost all your cards (even noncreatures) are 2cmc or less it means an almost guaranteed 2-for-1 in an already very pushy aggro deck. For this reason I had to cut it.
2 mv 2/1 first strike is already pretty good, and getting to draw a card some/most of the time (depending on the deck). A card being exiled forever is not much different than it being on the bottom of the library so it's all upside to me.
MH3 has me thinking a lot about individual card choices. I currently run Ministrant of Obligation primarily as a support piece for the WB attrition deck. It also is a decent speed bump that dies into more fliers for the UW fliers deck. Am I crazy for thinking that Ministrant better serves my purpose than Indebted Spirit?
Spirit gives you the option of playing it as Doomed Traveler, but is a lot slower to net two spirits than Ministrant when bestowed. I don't have any cards that care about auras or enchantments in my environment either, and most other decks would care very little about the +1/+1 buff.
I'm only trying out 14 cards, which is low compared to other people. I'm avoiding the MDFCs though because I know they would just confuse my drafters. I also only run uncommons. Still, I think about half the cards I'm adding are very powerful forever-cards, and they all seem fun to play with.
White
Indebted Spirit - Perfect for WB sacrifice, but I'm worried no other deck wants it.
Glyph Elemental - Perfect for WG +1/+1 counters, but I think also just powerful enough that other white decks will want it too.
Metastatic Evangel - Another card primarily for WG, but other decks might use +1/+1 counters too, and a 2-mana 3/1 is a fine base.
Blue
Emrakul's Messenger - Just a great aggressive 2-drop, probably best in the more proactive UR spells decks, but also at home in UW blink and UG flash
Hope-Ender Coatl - Slam dunk for UG flash. As much as the cast trigger is at odds with UW blink synergies and the creature is at odds with UR spells, I think any blue deck, particularly any proactive blue deck, will happily play this.
Brainsurge - Happy to have another good instant-speed card draw spell. It's not the best, but I think it's good enough to be welcome.
Black
Marionette Apprentice - BW and BR aristocrats are in heaven, and even BG graveyard might enjoy this. So powerful!
Wurmcoil Larva - Perfect for BG graveyard and 3-color value piles. It might end up being a little anemic for 5 mana, but it's so cool that I'm gonna try and hope it ends up being great.
Dreadmobile - I'm not sure if this'll be good enough for BW or BR sacrifice - it's not a creature, it's not a free sac outlet, and it doesn't produce value. But it's also stickier than a creature, and can become a huge beater.
Red
Amped Raptor - I hate that it uses energy, but the power is there, and aggro decks can always use a little love.
Reckless Pyrosurfer - Not sure how good this will end up being, but again, I like supporting aggro when I can.
Skittering Processor - We'll see how limiting this ends up being, requiring both sacrifice (not just death) and non-token creatures. But a 3-mana 3/3 menace isn't a bad baseline, so we'll try. Best in RB sac, but honestly not bad in RW or RG aggro.
Ghostfire Slice - 3 mana for 4 damage anywhere at instant speed is good enough to happily play, and I think the cost reduction is a real thing. Awesome!
Green
Territory Culler - I refuse to believe a 5-mana 7/5 with no drawback is bad in peasant. Reach will be nice sometimes, but the landfall trigger is actually great. Perfect for GB graveyard and GR stompy.
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My peasant cube list: Uncommonly Good (only uncommons, with rare lands)
[b][u]Red[/u][/b]
[list]
[*]Amped Raptor - I hate that it uses energy, but the power is there, and aggro decks can always use a little love.
I am stuck in a rut of there being too much aggro in my list and it pushing everything else out. I have tried to just not include too many explicit anti-aggro cards but it seems like most of the best cards nowadays just keep making these decks better and better by so much more than any other decks can hope to match.
List tags are malformed.
I am stuck in a rut of there being too much aggro in my list and it pushing everything else out. I have tried to just not include too many explicit anti-aggro cards but it seems like most of the best cards nowadays just keep making these decks better and better by so much more than any other decks can hope to match.
Huh, that's weird, I could've sworn I just saw you say in another thread that you cut Fire Covenant.
Two for ones where only one of the "Two" affect the board don't tend to be good against aggro because the extra "one" (probably a card draw) is paid for by being low on tempo.
I'm running basically all of the ones on that list, but I didn't want my list populated by a ton of samey value creatures so I don't have FTK (already have twinshot sniper) and I don't have Skinrender.
Fire covenant is, if anything, the best aggro card in our cardpool.
I have put a lot of mental energy into not removing cards that happen to be good in the aggro matchup and to preferentially include as much lifegain as possible. Unfortunately, I *really* don't like cards like wall of [insert noun] since they are so narrow but I'm not even that convinced that they are good against aggro as much as they are good against midrange. Aggro just dumps too many guys on the board.
I did my first post MH3 draft and this anti-aggro topic was on my mind. 2 of the 6 decks went heavy on token production and at least two more had explicit go-wide support and some token creation. I played Rakdos sacrifice, splashing white for Lingering Souls and Craig Boone, Novac Guard (who was awesome). Some MH3 specific thoughts:
Amped Raptor was very good. I had exactly 50% of my other spells as hits and went 3-for-3 on the day. The ceiling is so high when you hit and the fact that you can easily exceed a 50% hit rate when you draft means this is here to stay.
8 of 10 MDFC duals were in the draft and I never saw a single spell cast. That said, everyone seemed happy to have those spells available and preferred them to other Peasant duals.
The Brainstorm drafter felt the Cube was still light on shuffle effects and I wonder if going up to 15 total shuffling lands (in a 512 cube) is enough for the various Delirium/Landfall/Revolt effects I am now playing.
I have thought for a while about the 2-for-1 spells that are intentionally for the non-aggro decks as anti-aggro cards. I have been hesitant to play anything like that below 5 mana, where Volcanic Torrent kicks in (and I really like that card).
I could see myself trying something at 4 mana like an Arms of Hadar or Thunderwave. Is Arc Trail a reasonable card that the aggro decks want?
15 shuffle effects in 512 means you're probably only opening 9-10 in a full 8-person draft, which is barely over 1 per player. Even assuming someone could nab a couple extra, I still don't think that's close to enough to "enable" Brainstorm. You either need to cut down to 360 or add a bunch more, possibly both. That said, I wouldn't stress too much about "enabling" a single 1-mana spell. I think it's still a totally fine cantrip even without a single shuffle effect - not constructed playable, but totally above the threshold for peasant cube playable.
In my experience, Arc Trail wrecks aggro decks. I've never seen it not get a clean 2-for-1, which as you say is something you normally start seeing up at 4 mana, not 2. I guess an aggro deck might play it, but it's bad against the 3+ toughness blockers that actually give them problems, so I definitely see it as more of a control card.
What were the play patterns like on Craig Boone, Novac Guard? I've considered him to replace Sunrise Cavalier, but his keywords are so much worse for an aggro deck. How much damage did Craig's triggered ability do?
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My peasant cube list: Uncommonly Good (only uncommons, with rare lands)
It is SO HARD to find anti-aggro cards that 1) actually work 2) are compelling to draft 3) aren't dead in other matchups and 4) aren't just backbreaking.
Life of Toshiro Umezawa is a card I regretfully misjudged when it came out, I'm back to forked bolt (since it only backbraking 2 for 1s it gets are "what you get" for playing so many 1 toughness swarming guys), and found fungal infection to be a diamond in the rough. Hello again Cunning Sparkmage and Fireslinger, look at all the tokens you guys need to eat! Lava dart to help my Threnody singer win combat once and then hold off attackers next turn? Maybe. Orc sureshot has been cool, too... Even if it is a nuclear bomb when it's helping the battle screech decks instead of being used against them.
I'm trying to collect a lot of these 1-toughness dealing effects right now, hoping they can by their constellations actually get in the way. The on-board (or otherwise free) 1 damage effects can be combined with the in-hand ones to hit the two-toughness guys but not be turned against the defensive player's creatures so easily. But it's tough.
//
Craig Boone has been strong for me (always hits face, hard to race, is a lightningrod) but it isn't exactly... interesting? There's no way to make it better really other than "always have guys". I might go back to heroic reinforcements just because that card helps your deck feel like it has direction rather than be a pile of great cards.
Back in the olden days, I was a big proponent of darkblast. But then I became one of the people who soured on it for much the same reason I argued against soulherder in the other thread: if it's good in a matchup or in a gamestate the whole game revolves around it.
And all while giving you free cards in the graveyard to get ahead.
I cut Brainstorm for Portent and reversed the swap after our new fetches came out. I will re-reverse if Brainstorm does not meet its substantial upside.
I will not say that it is *impossible* to lose if you get Craig Boone’s attack trigger twice, but it is improbable. It’s also a really strong benefit to curving out 1-2-3.
I luckily have not felt the need for explicit anti-aggro cards, but there are a lot of good suggestions here. Leelue, did you like Fear, Fire, Foes! as an anti-aggro tool? That feels decent enough without being backbreaking.
When the Lucky Paper fixing article on fixing came up again recently, I started thinking more about the “sideboard card” as part of Peasant Cube. The card you would maindeck sometimes but does pretty good work in certain matchups. Volcanic Torrent against aggro hits that sweet spot of being very good against aggro without being backbreaking due to its mana value.
Does anyone else have other cards they play in that same way?
FFF was regarded as the best card in the cube by basically everyone and was cut. Seismic Wave is in now as the """downgrade""".
I try not to play any cards that are mainly for the sideboard, but I also only draft 36 cards per player and we only draft out of the first half of packs. That's not conducive to having cards wheel around and sit on the side. Volcanic Torrent is good though, but I'm playing Ral and the Implicit Maze
in that place. The way my cube is constructed even slow decks are a mob of small creatures so 2-toughness sweepers are usually bananas.
Inclusions
Glyph Elemental - Landfall support made better with the landscapes. Bestow is also a solid upside.
Envoy of the Ancestors - Strictly better Abzan Battle Priest.
Aerie Auxiliary - Most of the time this will out perform Relief Captain.
Triton Wavebreaker - Good for blue aggro, both early and later in the game (Bestow).
Emrakul's Messenger - Good for Blue aggro that can produce blockers for protection.
Hope-Ender Coatl - Flier + Force Spike. Counter is also on cast.
Brainsurge - Viable with the inclusion of the Landscapes.
Marionette Apprentice - Possibly the second best Blood Artist.
Reckless Pyrosurfer - Good aggro threat that synergies with the landscapes.
Ghostfire Slice - Char with upside.
Basking Broodscale - +1/+1 counter payoff. Also goes infinite with Rosie Cotton of South Lane on curve.
Evolution Witness - Another +1/+1 counter payoff.
Malevolent Rumble - A Satyr Wayfinder for permanents that can also generate mana and self sacrifice.
Signature Slam - Bite + counter payoff.
Landscapes - Probably my favorite addition. Not only are they pretty reasonable fixing, but they enable a lot of other strategies such as landfall, delve, threshold, etc.
Eldrazi Ravager - The fact it self-bins and is not impossible to cast makes it attractive over Ulamog's Crusher.
Witch Enchanter + Razorgrass Ambush + Sink into Stupor + Pinnacle Monk + Fell the Profane - MDFCs offer a high degree of flexibility and now every color has at least one.
Testing
Metastatic Evangel - Does not do anything upon ETB and does not trigger on tokens. I think this will end up being impactful enough, but I can see it getting replaced.
Serum Visionary - A lot of other cards can fit in this slot, testing it over Sea Gate Oracle.
Glimpse the Impossible - A lot of words that support a range of archetypes. The question will be how often it works they you want it to.
Writhing Chrysalis - This card is really pushed, but does not really support a signpost. I usually want a little more from the guild slot.
My 540-card Signed Legacy Cube
My 2-Player Signed Legacy Cube
My Lord of the Rings Cube
W
Dauntless Bodyguard -> Indebted Spirit
Adanto Vanguard -> Glyph Elemental
Barbed Spike -> Mandibular Kite
Rescuer Chwinga -> Envoy of the Ancestors
Custodi Squire -> Aerie Auxiliary
Faith's Fetters -> Dog Umbra
Cheeky House-Mouse -> Rosecot Knight
U
Rise from the Tides -> Brainsurge
Hypnotic Sprite -> Emrakul's Messenger
Behold the Unspeakable -> Copycrook
Winter Eladrin -> Hope-Ender Coatl
B
Order of Midnight -> Marionette Apprentice
Falkenrath Noble -> Wurmcoil Larva
Corpse Augur -> Grim Servant
Murderous Cut -> Dreadmobile
Gifted Aetherborn -> Accursed Marauder
R
Toggo, Goblin Weaponsmith -> Skittering Precursor
Stoke the Flames -> Ghostfire Slice
Stormblood Berserker -> Reckless Pyrosurfer
Magma Jet -> Galvanic Discharge
G
Sakura-Tribe Elder -> Basking Broodscale
Armored Scrapgorger -> Propagator Drone
Avacyn's Pilgrim -> Hydra Trainer
Spider Spawning -> Signature Slam
Timeless Witness -> Evolution Witness
Pack Guardian -> Territory Culler
Poison Dart Frog -> Nightshade Dryad
Hard-Hitting Question -> Horrific Assault
Harmonize -> Malevolent Rumble
Invigorate -> Gift of the Viper
Bala Ged Recovery -> Bridgeworks Battle
Bookwurm -> Nyxborn Hydra
Full Steam Ahead -> Temperamental Oozewagg
C
Blasting Station -> Eldrazi Ravager
Lands
+ Bountiful Landscape
+ Contaminated Landscape
+ Deceptive Landscape
+ Foreboding Landscape
+ Perilous Landscape
Thriving Bluff -> Seething Landscape
Thriving Grove -> Shattered Landscape
Thriving Heath -> Sheltering Landscape
Thriving Isle -> Tranquil Landscape
Thriving Moor -> Twisted Landscape
These are 44 inclusions from the set and not all cards have arrived yet, so there might be a few more. Wow.
Legacy Cube(I stopped updating this one)I did 3-0 in my cube with mono red and Amped Raptor has been crazy. Taking into account almost all your cards (even noncreatures) are 2cmc or less it means an almost guaranteed 2-for-1 in an already very pushy aggro deck. For this reason I had to cut it.
(410, Peasant, Unpowered)
2 mv 2/1 first strike is already pretty good, and getting to draw a card some/most of the time (depending on the deck). A card being exiled forever is not much different than it being on the bottom of the library so it's all upside to me.
My Cubes:
Peasant Travel Cube on CubeCobra (180 cards, modern frames) (mtgsalvation thread can be found here)
I had a blog for a while @ peasant-cube.blogspot.com where I may or may not post again, lol
Spirit gives you the option of playing it as Doomed Traveler, but is a lot slower to net two spirits than Ministrant when bestowed. I don't have any cards that care about auras or enchantments in my environment either, and most other decks would care very little about the +1/+1 buff.
Here is what I'm thinking. This set is ridiculous.
Envoy of the Ancestors --> Fairgrounds Warden
Aerie Auxiliary --> Relief Captain
Witch Enchanter --> Elite Scaleguard
Hope-Ender Coatl --> Picklock Prankster
Emrakul's Messenger --> Hypnotic Sprite
Brainsurge --> Kasmina, Enigmatic Mentor
Copycrook --> Shipwreck Dowser
Sink into Stupor --> Condescend
Marionette Apprentice --> Dockside Chef
Wurmcoil Larva --> Vampire Sovereign
Fell the Profane --> Bloodchief's Thirst
Grim Servant --> Skinrender
Reckless Pyrosurfer --> Iraxxa, Empress of Mars
Ghostfire Slice --> Searing Spear
Basking Broodscale --> Imperious Perfect
Territory Culler --> Blossom Prancer
Malevolent Rumble --> Winding Way
Eldrazi Ravager --> Sphinx of the Guildpact
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
Follow me. I tweet.
White
Blue
Black
Red
Green
I am stuck in a rut of there being too much aggro in my list and it pushing everything else out. I have tried to just not include too many explicit anti-aggro cards but it seems like most of the best cards nowadays just keep making these decks better and better by so much more than any other decks can hope to match.
List tags are malformed.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Huh, that's weird, I could've sworn I just saw you say in another thread that you cut Fire Covenant.
I think the #1 way to push back on aggro is with 2-for-1s that affect the board. Lingering Souls, Man-o'-War, Whirler Rogue, Repulse, Ravenous Chupacabra, Gonti, Lord of Luxury, Skinrender, Flametongue Kavu, Arc Trail, Kaleidoscorch, Eternal Witness, Halana, Kessig Ranger, Circuit Mender... Any time you can kill a creature (or make a creature unable to profitably attack) and go up a card, it's so powerful against aggro. The 2 and 3 mana ones are especially brutal, because the aggro player can't even effectively go underneath you.
I'm running basically all of the ones on that list, but I didn't want my list populated by a ton of samey value creatures so I don't have FTK (already have twinshot sniper) and I don't have Skinrender.
Fire covenant is, if anything, the best aggro card in our cardpool.
I have put a lot of mental energy into not removing cards that happen to be good in the aggro matchup and to preferentially include as much lifegain as possible. Unfortunately, I *really* don't like cards like wall of [insert noun] since they are so narrow but I'm not even that convinced that they are good against aggro as much as they are good against midrange. Aggro just dumps too many guys on the board.
If only they'd print more cards like behold the unspeakable or ral and the implicit maze (lol why are we referencing dragon's maze
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
Amped Raptor was very good. I had exactly 50% of my other spells as hits and went 3-for-3 on the day. The ceiling is so high when you hit and the fact that you can easily exceed a 50% hit rate when you draft means this is here to stay.
8 of 10 MDFC duals were in the draft and I never saw a single spell cast. That said, everyone seemed happy to have those spells available and preferred them to other Peasant duals.
The Brainstorm drafter felt the Cube was still light on shuffle effects and I wonder if going up to 15 total shuffling lands (in a 512 cube) is enough for the various Delirium/Landfall/Revolt effects I am now playing.
I have thought for a while about the 2-for-1 spells that are intentionally for the non-aggro decks as anti-aggro cards. I have been hesitant to play anything like that below 5 mana, where Volcanic Torrent kicks in (and I really like that card).
I could see myself trying something at 4 mana like an Arms of Hadar or Thunderwave. Is Arc Trail a reasonable card that the aggro decks want?
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/peasantsnowcube
-- Updated with Bloomburrow
The PioneWer Peasant CUbe
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/pionewer
-- Updated with Murders at Karlov Manor
In my experience, Arc Trail wrecks aggro decks. I've never seen it not get a clean 2-for-1, which as you say is something you normally start seeing up at 4 mana, not 2. I guess an aggro deck might play it, but it's bad against the 3+ toughness blockers that actually give them problems, so I definitely see it as more of a control card.
What were the play patterns like on Craig Boone, Novac Guard? I've considered him to replace Sunrise Cavalier, but his keywords are so much worse for an aggro deck. How much damage did Craig's triggered ability do?
Life of Toshiro Umezawa is a card I regretfully misjudged when it came out, I'm back to forked bolt (since it only backbraking 2 for 1s it gets are "what you get" for playing so many 1 toughness swarming guys), and found fungal infection to be a diamond in the rough. Hello again Cunning Sparkmage and Fireslinger, look at all the tokens you guys need to eat! Lava dart to help my Threnody singer win combat once and then hold off attackers next turn? Maybe. Orc sureshot has been cool, too... Even if it is a nuclear bomb when it's helping the battle screech decks instead of being used against them.
I'm trying to collect a lot of these 1-toughness dealing effects right now, hoping they can by their constellations actually get in the way. The on-board (or otherwise free) 1 damage effects can be combined with the in-hand ones to hit the two-toughness guys but not be turned against the defensive player's creatures so easily. But it's tough.
//
Craig Boone has been strong for me (always hits face, hard to race, is a lightningrod) but it isn't exactly... interesting? There's no way to make it better really other than "always have guys". I might go back to heroic reinforcements just because that card helps your deck feel like it has direction rather than be a pile of great cards.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
WiJ
Peasant 540 Cube
And all while giving you free cards in the graveyard to get ahead.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article
I cut Brainstorm for Portent and reversed the swap after our new fetches came out. I will re-reverse if Brainstorm does not meet its substantial upside.
I will not say that it is *impossible* to lose if you get Craig Boone’s attack trigger twice, but it is improbable. It’s also a really strong benefit to curving out 1-2-3.
I luckily have not felt the need for explicit anti-aggro cards, but there are a lot of good suggestions here. Leelue, did you like Fear, Fire, Foes! as an anti-aggro tool? That feels decent enough without being backbreaking.
When the Lucky Paper fixing article on fixing came up again recently, I started thinking more about the “sideboard card” as part of Peasant Cube. The card you would maindeck sometimes but does pretty good work in certain matchups. Volcanic Torrent against aggro hits that sweet spot of being very good against aggro without being backbreaking due to its mana value.
Does anyone else have other cards they play in that same way?
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/peasantsnowcube
-- Updated with Bloomburrow
The PioneWer Peasant CUbe
https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/pionewer
-- Updated with Murders at Karlov Manor
I try not to play any cards that are mainly for the sideboard, but I also only draft 36 cards per player and we only draft out of the first half of packs. That's not conducive to having cards wheel around and sit on the side. Volcanic Torrent is good though, but I'm playing Ral and the Implicit Maze
in that place. The way my cube is constructed even slow decks are a mob of small creatures so 2-toughness sweepers are usually bananas.
Brainstorm has been great for me. The other day it synergized with candy trail in one game and Invasion of amonkhet in another. It'll be great with amped raptor. Oh, speaking of MH3, I managed to play grixis control splashing green for just Sylvan library, turning Mindless conscription into Bitterblossom on every drug known to man and sneaky snacker into flying+free reassembling skeleton. Brainstorm lets so many cards printed lately do cool things.
My CubeCobra (draft 20 card packs, 2 packs.)
430, Peasant, Very Unpowered
Why you should take your hybrids out of your gold section
Manamath Article