Big and Small Games Revisited

View the game size breakdowns for the Bun Magic Cube and Regular Cube. You can also copy this template and fill it out to calculate your own cube’s game size!

Andy and Anthony follow up on their recent discussion with Sam Black on ‘big’ and ‘small’ games of Magic. Sam coined these term in an article he wrote describing a nuanced understanding of card advantage including how effects create, or benefit from, high and low resource games. Our hosts expand on the topic and respond to feedback from the community on the subject. Andy breaks down his Bun Magic Cube and Anthony’s Regular Cube, categorizing each card based on the number of pieces they add or remove from play, and they compare the numerical analysis to their experience playing these environments.

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Discussed in this episode:

• Big and Small Games with Sam Black
• Elvish Visionary vs. Elderfang Disciple: the Nature of Card Advantage
• Limited Level Ups
• Andy’s coached match with Brian Coval
• March of the Machine and Commander Decks Cube Surveys
• XKCD: Ten Thousand

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction

1:35 - Review of big and small game theory

4:38 - The application of big and small game theory as a player

16:35 - The connection between mana cost and deck size

20:19 - Game size as a cube designer

23:51 - Spreadsheet deep dive on the Bun Magic and Regular Cube’s Size

49:55 - So did we learn anything!?

54:20 - On Nissa, Who Shakes the World and other notable cards

59:05 - Card advantage as the absolute value of game size

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at [email protected]. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

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Musical production by DJ James Nasty.