Playing to Win: Evaluating New Cubes

Andy and Anthony talk about how they approach drafting a cube they’ve never played before. What do they look for in the list to optimize their chances of success, and have a good time doing it. After discussing power outliers and big picture structure of an environment, they agree one of the most important aspects to focus on is the speed of the format, which shapes the tempo-value balance and the effectiveness of different strategies. It’s challenging to evaluate an environment just by looking at the list, and they share some heuristics they use to get a head start.

Our listener submitted pack 1, pick 1 this week comes from Ryan’s Peasantish Cube.

Timestamps:

• 0:00 Show Intro
• 1:57 Introduction of Main Topic
• 6:43 Anthony’s First Point: Read the Cube Overview
• 10:04 Andy’s First Point: Look for Supported Broken Strategies
• 14:55 Anthony’s Second Point: Look for Patterns and Familiar Cards
• 17:11 Andy’s Second Point and Anthony’s Third Point: Determine the Speed of the Environment
• 24:59 Andy’s Third Point: Quantity and Quality of Removal and Board Wipes
• 26:50 Should the Density of Mana Fixing Affect How You Draft an Environment?
• 39:22 Andy’s Fourth Point: Look at What the Cube Wants You To Do
• 40:46 Familiarity Bias
• 42:04 Know Your Opponent and Meta
• 46:44 Anthony’s Bonus Point: Look at the Low Mana Value Cards
• 49:15 Listener Submitted Pack 1, Pick 1
• 1:03:53 Outro

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

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

If you have a question for the show, or want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube, email us at [email protected]. Please include how you’d like to be credited on air, your pronouns, and if you’re submitting a cube for the pack 1, pick 1, a link to said cube.

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Musical production by DJ James Nasty.