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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 10h

To one of your points, I think waaaaaaay back when I first made this list, one of my biggest goals was making sure that the environment "still felt like cube" - which at the time meant including recognizable and high-power cards.

That goal no longer applies, and thus those cards make less sense.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 10h

But seeing some of the following changes:
-Cutting the Draft Matter stuff (no longer sparking joy)
-Shaving some of the top 10 outliers
-Some updates that have been on my list anyway.

Will see how the draft goes (maybe do an upkeep draft in a week or 2) and how I'm feeling.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 10h

I think this is my plan. I've made some tentative updates and ordered some cards, and I'm going to try an updated version.

Here's my current thinking. I don't necessarily think about this as a "radically different" power level (keeping some of the above cards).

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

We immediately fired 8 draft pods of different cubes after this community panel. It was incredible.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

Got connected to Derek Gallen, @gdekker.io, and the very early nascent cube community as of CubeCon '22. Made great friends and got to see my cube celebrated on the main stage of MagicCon Philly 2023. I think that's all really cool.

Conrad Hackett @conradhackett.bsky.social · 1d

Has anything great happened in your life because of social media?

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

Yeah, I don't think I agree with this take. The interactive spells are such good (not "Powerful" but like, healthy) additions to the cube. Other than Fleshraker, I don't think many of the other cards are like "best in slot" for their respective MV either necessarily. But opinion heard!

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

Yeah, it's just the rainbow foil version, it would be fine.

Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

Which of the MH3 Eldrazi are your big concerns? I feel like the Fleshraker is definitely a concern, and maybe the Linebreaker, but everything else hasn't felt too egregious to me, especially as they're mostly colored, and that pushes up the tension for them.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

If you've drafted this cube, I'd love your POV on if you think these might be cards whose time has come.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

I still kind of love Chaos Orb and Tower as two of the most powerful cards in the cube, but they are cards that I've heard some of the biggest complaints about and if I'm trimming other power outliers, the gap between these two and the rest of the cube magnifies.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

The lands and Chaos Orb are the ones I'm most conflicted about. For a long time, Aggro really needed the help of getting out fast against big mana decks, but the quality of threats has really increased faster than the quality of interaction, so I'm not sure if they're still serving their purpose.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

I think Clamp, Smuggler's Copter, and The One Ring didn't shine here specifically beyond being very strong. I had hoped Palantir would be a "Phyrexian Arena" but it's always wildly performed above that. And Memory Jar never quite found a home in any of the common decks in the cube.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

I've grown a lot as a designer since I last looked at this cube. Initially I think I had a focus on including POWERFUL cards so that the cube still "felt like cube" - what Cube is has evolved so far, that I don't think that still makes sense as a design goal, which starts to make these feel suspect.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

A few weeks ago I played against Skullclamp in a less-than-highpowered cube for the first time in a while and I walked away from that experience thinking "I think it's time to cut this from the Devoid Cube" which prompted me to think quite a bit more about the cube overall.

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 1d

It's been a bit of time since I've focused or taken a holistic look at the Devoid Cub and thinking about making some pretty significant changes re: power outliers. These are the cards that I'm thinking about potentially cutting (thread to follow)...

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Reposted by Dan Schneider

robin 🥀 @tarmogal.bsky.social · 2d

been really burnt out on magic and have barely touched it in over a month but last nite rena & i drafted a sick vintage cube deck and i was like “ohhhh i love this actually!!!”

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 2d

Cube is healing. We'll have the Upkeep Cube draft to look forward to!

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 2d

I think the card is Fun but not Great. I think that if you're going to play it, it will do best in an environment that has Draw 7s, as they are able to make the most out of the Moxen not just being 5 lands added to your deck. You do also have to contend with the logistics of blinking it...

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 3d

This has rapidly become one of my favorite (positive) go-to posts in the @cubeforacause.upkeepnewyork.com discord as folks pull lists together for cubes:

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 4d

@andrewmagrini.bsky.social you have been invoked

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 5d

I mean, even in constructed formats you have metas where control decks are popular and have lots of trouble finishing 2-3 games in 50min, which is why tournaments time rounds. This doesn’t seem outside the bounds of regular play 🤷‍♂️

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Dan Schneider @worklifevalue.bsky.social · 5d

Some cubes definitely lend themselves a bit more toward a grind, but we’re seeing this across certain players/preferences across a wide variety of environments. Sometimes people like to build controlling or grindy decks, and sometimes they roll into mirrors.

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