For this update we have battlebond and M2019. Both together amount for roughly one large set in terms of number of new cards printed. All colors got some new toys in this update. The swaps are mostly just upgrades. The artifact deck archetype in blue should get a noticeable boost. White, hence all the cube, started to care a little bit about humans. Warrirors became a relevant subtype, probably about as much as zombie. Random trivia: all the new cards bar one are creatures and planeswalkers.
White
White gets only creature swaps, but all along the curve from 1 to 4 mana. It started to care a little about Humans.
–Dryad Militant, +Champion of the Parish
Champion requires ~5 other humans that cost 2 or less in your deck to reliably be a 2/2 or larger on turn two when played on turn 1. While the card was tried out before, we have a lot more humans nowadays, with 17 in white alone that cost 2 or less (9.5 in average per draft). While Champion is possibly the weakest topdeck in a given deck, it can be the best turn 1 play and can even be a decent midgame one drop if it can be pumped to a relevant size. Red has many humans, and other colors have some smatterings as well. It has special synergy with Hanweir Garrison and Bloodsoaked Champion. A card that trades consistency with powerlevel, but seems like a worthy tryout.
Dryad is cut for not being human. Her static ability has never been too relevant in years of playing, and the hybrid cost is not really a thing as green doesn’t support aggro.
–Stormfront Pegasus, +Remorseful Cleric
Obviously a pure upgrade. Cleric is maindeckable graveyard hate, and that is a big deal, especially for white aggressive decks that are usually light on answers and disruption. Hoses reanimator, delve, flashback, embalm, little Jace, Snapcaster, Torrential Gearhulk and many more on top of a perfectly playable body. Don’t expect this to be as strong as Selfless Spirit though.
–Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit, +Paliano Vanguard
Vanguard got two new tribes to play with – vampires, which increased in number in white, and warriors, which gets some slight support. That is of course in addition to humans.
Mostly though, Anafenza sucks. The double white cost is difficult and she has to come down early. The pump doesn’t work with tokens, so she is just a restrictive two drop for aggro/midrange. As she always pumps the smallest creatures, she is doubly bad with tokens.
–Silverblade Paladin, +Resplendent Angel
TL;DR – Angel is a powerful card in multiple in several points in the game, yet still reads better than it will play.
Starting with the good, the base mode of a 3/3 flier for 1WW is solid. It is not great, the cost is restrictive, but it is still pretty efficient. As always, fliers continue to be relevant much longer than most creatures as the game progresses. It will limit your opponent’s lines of play with planeswalkers. My main argument is that most of the time this is all it will ever be. The obvious weakness that all stat monsters share to bounce and removals is not too bad on a three drop. You need to draw removal eventually and they won’t always have it.
The activated ability threatens to cause a life swing of 10 AND create a Serra Angel on top. Easily worth the price of six mana. Or is it? First of all it costs triple white, which will limit the use of that ability severely. Second, this opens you up for serious blowouts in the face of removal. If the angel is killed or bounced in response to its ability, you are losing your entire turn in addition to the card itself and its initial mana cost. The risk factor is amplified by the fact the angel broadcasts the threat. I believe against many decks, using the ability will be too risky to be the default use. It will be something you do when you can afford to (meaning, you are considerably ahead anyway) or when you have no choice.
The trigger is strong, free Serra Angels are very big game. That said, there are few ways to gain life in large chunks. Triggering off of Thragtusk will be brutal. The combo with Lyra Dawnbringer is also sweet, though easily disrupted and win more. Everything else will require several cards. This is not an irrelevant upside, but one that is hard to build around and will rarely matter.
Now I don’t hate the card, what I am suggesting is too look at it more like a Warden of the First Tree. Both card’s six mana abilities will be a rare occurrence, but they both have a good base mode. The abilities do command respect – your opponent will NEED to address them sooner or later. As a monocolored card, in a weak color, this is good enough to make the list for a while despite not being a bomb.
Paladin is the cut as it was the weakest 1WW costing creature. It does nothing alone, is prone to mid combat removal. If History of Benalia will prove weak, Paladin will come back and replace it.
–Reveillark, +Leonin Warleader
Reveillark didn’t see play in this cube for years and should have been cut a while ago. Too much has to go right for a deck to want to play it. The restriction is very limiting, and the card doesn’t fit easily to existing archetypes. Too slow and expensive for aggro, too few targets in control and not the sort of card you want to ramp into. As a build around card it doesn’t have a high enough payoff. White five drops are pretty competitive nowadays.
Leonin Warleader is similar to Hero of Bladehold. Not as strong, but you don’t have to be better than Bladehold to be great. Hanweir Garrison is another strong card that does something similar. White has more upside for tokens than red. Anthems and Mirror Entity are obviously good with it, so are Kytheon and Legion’s Landing. The card is weak to bounce and removal, but pretty hard to race – hard to block, gains life and a decent blocker itself. Survives burn well. Can split attacks between planeswalkers and the opponent.
Blue
Blue got two new, very powerful planeswalkers. It also got two new strong support cards for the artifact deck. Two three drops finish up this round of newcomers. An impressive bunch considering how hard it is to crack the color.
–Jace, Unraveler of Secrets, +Will Kenrith
Massive upgrade. Will has to be one of the best stabilizers in the cube. It starts at 6 loyalty and neutralizes 2 creatures so is very hard to take down in combat or with burn. Drawing two cards and getting a major cost reduction is an effect that competes with many draw spells favorably. Will seems very good when you are behind and provides plenty of card advantage when ahead. I dislike the fact that he cannot close games himself, a problem some blue decks here have. This is why he replaces scry Jace, which is also not a win condition. That version of Jace is not powerful enough to cut it these days. He loses too much loyalty for the bounce, the draw is slow and he never wins the game.
–Glyph Keeper, +Tezzeret, Artifice Master
TL;DR – Massive power level boost, and the new Tezzeret supports multiple archetypes well.
Seeker is stronger than most people give it credit for. It is hard to stop. As far as win conditions go you can do much worse. Rarely can you actually point four spells or abilities at it to permanently kill it. What it doesn’t do well at all is stabilize you. Having only three toughness means two drops kill it as a blocker. Also, while killing it permanently is hard, killing it once is far more doable. Blue decks have problems sometimes finishing games, but being a dedicated finisher for five mana is an awkward place to be. You can pay more and do the job more reliably and quickly, or get more defense for your mana. As a minor concern, I’d rather reduce the amount of shroud as a few edict effects have been cut from the cube.
Tezzeret is really good. It protects itself well, starting with 6 loyalty and a blocker. It is also a reliable win condition, both for creating a flying army and because the ultimate is strong. The 0 loyalty ability is obviously very exciting, drawing 2 cards extra per turn is crazy good. Tezzeret is both an enabler and payoff for artifact decks. It is also the only ongoing source of tokens in blue in the cube for Opposition. You don’t have to be all in on artifacts to play him either, a mana rock or two on the battlefield should do fine. It does have natural synergy with many artifacts anyway, producing bodies to equip or crew vehicles with.
–Pull from Tomorrow, +The Antiquities War
Pull is expensive and inefficient, and there is enough blue card draw going that I don’t think it will be missed. Even Fact or Fiction is showing its age lately. TAW can be a serviceable tool for the artifact deck. That archetype is hard to support at this cube size. It is only playable there too, so it better be strong enough to justify itself. If not, it will be interesting to see whether it or Tezzeret the Seeker would be the next cut from blue.
Spellseeker fetches Time Walk, Ancestral Recall, Channel, Mana Drain, Balance, Mind Twist, Cyclonic Rift, most burn spells, most counters, many spot removals and all tutors. Getting a cantrip or bounce is also not the worst. I have no doubt she will be good enough in decks with power, but will she be playable without? The card advantage/selection is good, but the body is underpowered. She’s likely better than Sea Gate Oracle, but not by a ton on the average case.
Deep Analysis has a terrible rate on the front end, and is just too slow for this age. Becomes much better when discarded, but not good enough without the synergies.
–Baral’s Expertise, +Exclusion Mage
Expertise is just narrow. You don’t easily find the targets needed to cast it. Even harder for you to be able to utilize the free spell. Unless you are a tempo deck, or using Arcane Savant, it merely buys time, which is not strong for a five drop.
Man-o’-War is now a human wizard. Barely a relevant difference for cube in blue. There a few other cosmetic differences between them. Man-o’-War can bounce your own creature. Corner cases where it is crucial is, for example, when you need to bounce your own Dark Confidant when at a low life total. A more common scenario is to reuse an ETB trigger. This also barely happens as you are conceding a lot of tempo for it. Exclusion Mage cannot do that, but can be played on an empty board without having to bounce itself. Important when you have an equipment, or trying to land a blocker against a manland or hasty threat. Again probably barely relevant, as Exclusion Mage without the trigger is such a terrible creature that any other line of play is probably preferred. All in all it seems like Man-o’-War is better by a tiny fraction.
The question is therefore does the cube want another Man-o’-War? After all Aether Adept didn’t last. The jellyfish is a good tempo play. Obviously it is good when you are the aggressor, but it also one of the best blue cards against aggro. Bouncing a 3 drop and trading with a one or two drop is one of the better plays blue can make for the mana. Blue doesn’t have much interaction with the board at low mana costs, so I believe the card will be welcomed. Not costing double blue is a big deal. I don’t think Man-o’-War is top tier though, so I am not fully sold on Exclusion Mage.
Black
Black mostly got better low drops. It is one of the colors that now care about Warriors.
–Bearer of Silence, +Mindblade Render
Bearer is not strong as a two drop. The cast trigger is very conditional, both because it requires colorless mana and because Edict are conditional by their nature. A “kicked” Bearer is just not that strong usually, closer to Fire Imp than Ravenous Chupacabra in effect. The colorless costing cards are dwindling in numbers.
Render is the cheapest Ophidian ever printed. A better black two drop than Pain Seer, as the higher toughness is a very big deal for a card that needs to survive attacks (also draws the card immediately). It is cheap enough and defensive enough that I foresee slow decks using it too – occasionally it will draw a card, otherwise it will be a great blocker. A must stop threat for two mana against control too. Render makes the Warrior creature type very relevant, together with Najeela. Especially so for one drops. Admittedly, there are not many in black, but red and white both have decent amounts (more about this below).
–Cryptbreaker, +Tormented Hero
Cryptbreaker didn’t cut it. Yes, it is a discard outlet, but it doesn’t discard immediately when drawn late. Seldom do you care about the zombies in reanimator. He was mostly used in aggro decks, and he is poor there. Graveyard Marshal, added in this update, covers similar space in zombie token production. Hero is not the brightest, but he is a fine aggressive black one drop that got a lot more interesting with the new warrior support cards.
–Gifted Aetherborn, +Graveyard Marshal
Limited space for BB drops made this an easy swap. Aetherborn seldom came down on turn 2 in the defensive decks that want him most. Later in the game he’s not useless, but also not spectacular. Marshal is even more black heavy. As a two drop it is unexciting, but aggressive enough to do the job. As a five drop, if you have triple black, it is surprisingly good. Especially if you can follow it up with a double activation on turn six. Zombie tribal is also a bonus.
The downsides are numerous however. Not only is it black intensive, it requires critters in the grave. It doesn’t just make him narrow, in black there are some recursive creatures you don’t want to exile. The tokens coming into play tapped means it will not be strong on defense or easy to get card advantage with. At least it is a black two drop that can block!
–Vampire Nighthawk, +Isareth, the Awakener
Again, cutting a heavy black card for another. Both have 3 toughness and deathtouch even. Nighthawk has lifelink and flying, meaning it is a fairly useful card on defense and against aggro. It also hits planeswalkers fairly well. Nighthawk is a bit of a jack of all trades, but is never great. Too slow for aggro, too easy to answer for control. Isareth has a lot more late game power. Her ability is expensive, but critically colorless and has no targeting restrictions. The creature immediately attacks and you get ETB effects. This will end games quickly in a creature deck if allowed to live. As it has deathtouch, it should be a 2 for 1 at worst when attacking. Another three drop that should be a removal magnet, yet offering no value if removed.
–Herald of Torment, +Wretched Confluence
Confluence was swapped out recently for testing space. My plan all along was that we will find Bontu’s Last Reckoning lackluster and so Confluence will replace it. Alas, so far players here like Reckoning so a different cut had to be found. Confluence fills some of the space Demon of Dark Schemes occupied. It is pretty good against aggro if you survive long enough to cast it. It is of the better draw spell black has in cube. Being instant is very important for U/B decks, and there are many strong interactions of the card with blue (Arcane Savant, Torrential Gearhulk, baby Jace, Snapcaster). It can kill players with low life total, provide you with a lot of gas and is never dead.
Herald is almost a 5 drop. As a three drop, it is another 1BB costing one, and half the three drop black section costed that. It is yet another continual life loss card in a color that has plenty of them and little life gain. As a five drop it is a pure midrange card, as it requires cheap creatures yet costs a lot.
Red
Red in this update is all about creatures in the low part of the curve. Red also dubs in the warrior theme.
–Soul-Scar Mage, +Firebrand Fanatic
Soul Scar Mage is underwhelming. The counters ability was never relevant that I recall since his inclusion. As a 1/2 with prowess he is too inconsistent for aggro and too weak for anything else. Fanatic is not amazing, but a much more playable one drop filler. A better topdeck than most one drops. Good against mana elves, buffing other burn spells as removals, planeswalkers control and so on. Obviously not powerful, but suitable for the task. It is a better turn one play than Mogg Fanatic and equal when topdecked.
Not targeting players or planeswalkers makes this too narrow. Aggro would play any burn that goes to the face over it. Even if in theory it is playable in the theater, you are seldom left without better options in your drafted pile. If this could hit planeswalkers it would likely stay. It is also a sorcery, which is not the end of the world but again, many burn spells are instants so this has no reason to be played over them.
Courier is potentially another playable red one drop that has never been tried. What does it do? Best case scenario it is landed turn one, attacks every turn after, then is cashed later for cards when convenient. It can be expected to attack freely for 1-2 attacks (depending on matchup and who went first, but the average is closer to 2). Whenever you want to cache it in you can attack then activate before blockers to milk an extra card. It can be some early damage and cheap card draw in red. It can also immediately cycle itself in the late game, so it is a better topdeck than most red one drops. The final few notes is that as a cheap artifact that doubles as a discard outlet, Daretti decks really like it.
Reservations about the card include its slowness, and the fact that discarding your hand will not be feasible in all games. It is easy to imagine scenarios where the card will just be ignored because it cannot attack, and its controller cannot afford to discard its hand during the whole game. Maybe it will die with the next board wipe. Also, Raging Goblin are very easy to block and have historically been lacking.
–Lightning Mauler, +Dismissive Pyromancer
TL;DR – both occupy the space for a red two drop that’s not just for aggro, and plays well with other colors.
Mauler is weak in red decks. Most red cards costing 4 or more have natural haste. It usually doesn’t have haste when played on turn 2 (mostly because you don’t want to “waste” the soulbond). In theory it can grant haste to reanimated creatures and the like. Problem is the 2/1 body is not desirable in those decks so it is not worth a card. Mauler is only good in said decks when it survives long enough and you successfully reanimate something. The name for that in the street is win more. You’d rather play another combo piece (fattie, discard, reanimation), tutor, card selection, card advantage, a removal, basically anything over it.
Pyromancer is a versatile tool, the likes of which we have never seen in red. Repeatable loots are desirable to many decks. Obviously those that want the discard, but also U/R control decks and R/G ramp appreciate the card selection. As all looters, it fuels delve and delirium. The loot is expensive, and color intensive, but in return the card doubles as removal. Not efficient, but it will kill almost all creatures. The body is also pretty good for a looter. The card is slow, expensive and color intensive so it is far from a clear inclusion. It is a card that gives option and open up deckbuilding so is a worthy test.
–Burning-Fist Minotaur, +Viashino Pyromancer
TL;DR – Pyromancer is very close to a guaranteed two for one for burn decks.
Minotaur is fine but unexciting. Having first strike and potential firebreathing is good, 4/4 don’t want to block it. However, unless they block you don’t really want to activate it either. It is a risky ability to use in face of any instant removal or trickery. BFM is too expensive to be great.
Pyromancer is an agro only card. If we follow the philosophy of fire, 2 damage to the opponent are nearly worth a card. In that regard, Viashino Pyromancer’s trigger is almost like drawing a card then casting it for free. You don’t care too much about the body, as it is just free value. The card already redeemed itself. Yes, there are better bodies on one drops, but you don’t care if you trade with the lizard wizard, you don’t mind to overextend with it to a mass removal. You already got a card’s worth of value out of it. Needless to say, it is a pretty good topdeck in a burn deck, in general and especially for a two drop.
It is most similar to Keldon Marauders. Both do 2 damage total. It is better to do the full 2 damage immediately. Both because one turn can be a lot in Magic, and during that turn your opponent could win or suddenly gain life and be out of reach. Also, when targeting a planeswalker, killing it now (over next turn) at the very least prevents one use of an ability (and even worse, the planeswalker can gain enough loyalty during that turn to simply survive). A 2/1 body is obviously weaker than a 3/3 body, but when that body lasts for only a single turn it is unclear which is better. Kledon Marauder is a solid card, and if theorycrafting compares the Lizard favorably to it, it is likely not a shabby card.
–Plated Geopede, +Cheering Fanatic
Geopede is unreliable. Best case scenario, it is a 3/3 first striker, but only during your turn after the main phase, so very close to a 3/1 first striker in practice. That is good but very optimistic. The aggro decks that play Geopede usually pack 16 lands maximum, less if they have moxen. When you miss a land drop, it is amongst the poorest cards you can find. That is too inconsistent. It was fitting in the past when aggro options were thin and you had nothing better, now we do.
I predict Cheering Fanatic to be pretty bad. The pessimists see the Generator Servant in him, the optimists Lotus Cobra. Unlike the snake, Fanatic has to attack. It will never provide mana the turn you play him, and will have to suicide attack pretty often if you really need the ramp. He also only provides colorless mana, and never more than one a turn like Cobra does when combined with fetches. In aggressive decks I can’t see ramp being so important that you will play a bear over a real aggressive two drop just to get it. Then again, the space it will take was previously held by an equally bad card so we might as well try our luck.
–Captain Lannery Storm, +Najeela, the Blade-Blossom
Storm’s low toughness is a big concern. No non-aggressive deck wants the limp ramp. A failed experiment.
Najeela has a very high ceiling. If we assume she attacks alone, and isn’t blocked, she does 4 damage, then 6, then 9, a snowball potential only second to Rabblemaster for three drops! She can be a lot better than that too, if you attack with warriors the turn you cast her you gain immediate value and more of it, exponentially, over the next few turns. The warriors in the cube are naturally aggressive to begin with. She is an exciting card to try and meshes well with token themes such as mass pump and purphoros.
The bad part is that alone she is a very fragile attacker. A 2/2 will kill her, not to mention a first striker or almost any defense really. You truly want more warriors to support her, hopefully most of them costing less than three and that might be a tall order. Her 5 color ability is pretty unattainable.
People don’t maindeck Vandal. As a sideboard card against artifacts, there are better options. Abrade and Fiery Confluence in particular lessen the need for cards like it. It is also a bit of relic from an age where red three drop were weak. Manic Vandal could be brought back if artifacts become too powerful again.
Fire Imp comes back to the party. He was never too weak, rather his effect was unnecessary. Fire Imp is a great card against aggro, and significantly worse against control. Now we have plenty of good three drops for aggro in red. Actually, only one red three drop is clearly bad in aggro (Imperial Recruiter) and only one is truly broadly playable (Pia Nalaar). Red can use another.
For completion’s sake, Fire Imp is also very good against mana elves, and still playable against most decks as a tempo and value card.
Green
–Champion of Rhonas, +Bramble Sovereign
I’ve put Emrakul into play with Champion before, it won the game. That only happened in one draft ever since Champion was added. It is a type c redundancy for exactly one deck. It is certainly not strong enough for your ramp decks. In cheat decks it is better than Elvish Piper, as it costs less mana to cheat, has a larger body that survives more removals and attacks for more and you almost never need to cheat in two things. It is all true but barely relevant. You don’t care about the 3/3 body in such decks. Being able to cheat the card only if Champion survives a turn is slow and wishful.
Sovereign is also not the best. The card is weak outside of his ability. For the ability to trigger you need both creatures to trigger it and the mana to use it. If the creatures are too small, such as mana elves, the ability is not worth the mana, if the creatures are too big, you will not be able to pay for them and the trigger. As such you usually aim to double medium sized creatures. The problem is that green five drops are generally better than double green three drops. Sovereign is not a powerhouse, however it is a unique and fun effect. You can be creative with Sovereign and Summoner’s Bond (thanks Ido for pointing that out). Thankfully for Sovereign the competition at green four drops is limp and he is likely not the worst one in there still.
Multicolored
There are two new multicolored superfatties. Reanimator decks recently have felt that there are too few fatties to cheat. The multicolored ones are harder to cast, but that is not a big factor for the role they are filling. Perhaps an advantage even, as they should be uncontested during the draft.
–Dragonord Ojutai, +Teferi, Hero of Dominaria
Azorius decks have sometimes troubles at finishing games, as such I avoided adding a high curve card that cannot win. Turns out Teferi is just too good to ignore. Teferi helps an archetype that really needs it – permission decks have been on the decline for years. Teferi’s playstyle is like Garruk Wildspeaker in those decks, as his effective mana cost there is only three. Teferi has seen success in other cubes and constructed, and while he is not Fractured Identity, I expect him to deliver.
–Falkenrath Aristocrat, +Azra Oddsmaker
Azra can be a card advantage engine, that is cheap on top of being an acceptable body for its cost. It is also a discard outlet. This is offset by the fact that you need a creature to connect, and that will very likely make it too inconsistent. Oddsmaker has enough promise to be worth a test. Flakenrath is good, but there are too many aggro four drops even in mono red. A good card in a very competitive slot, in which redundancy is not needed. You are only playing 1-3 4 drops in our aggro deck as is.
–Edric, Spymaster of Trest, +Coiling Oracle
Edric is a win more card. Especially in those non-aggro colors, connecting with a creature early, let alone multiple creatures, is super hard. By itself Edric is just a 2/2 Ophidian. The average amount of cards it draws per game is closer to 0 than 1. It really requires a deck heavy with cheap creatures, preferably with evasion. A narrow card on top of being win more. A failed experiment. Oracle is kind of the opposite – a card that will never truly fail you, but will not amaze either. I expect the average case scenario to be better. When Oracle hits a land, he is both ramp and a body. The ramp works for nonbasic lands too, and puts the land untapped. Random 1/1 bodies that draw cards work well in green, a very partial list of synergies includes Gaea’s Cradle, Survival of the Fittest and Craterhoof Behemoth. I expect it to see frequent play in Simic decks.
–Sagu Mauler, +Simic Sky Swallower
That might be unexpected. Mauler reads better in at least three attributes. Mauler has Hexproof over Shroud, not a major buff but relevant with equipment. Mauler costs less which is undeniably huge. Finally, Mauler has Morph, which means he can start beating on turn 5. All it loses compared to SSS is flying, and he already has trample.
Certainly, Mauler has been effective in the past. Mauler lost power recently due to a variety of factors. First, when Mauler was printed green had only one playable six drop (Primeval Titan). Now there are three, with Carnage Tyrant especially doing the same thing better. Blue also improved in that department with Torrential Gearhulk. Most morph cards, from Tarkir and in general, have already been cut from the cube by now, which makes the morph ability less powerful as it is easier to guess which card it is. Not a strong argument however, as I haven’t seen Mauler morphed in at least a year. That is because the green three drop section truly exploded since Theros (since wizards stopped printed mana elves in standard they were able to push this part of the curve). Another big cause for weakening is the creature power creep. Nowadays he can die on offense to a pair of two drops pretty regularly. He will still deal some damage, but he is no longer that good of a finisher.
SSS is a reliable finisher. That seems small but is enough of a difference to make him attractive for reanimator and cheat decks. Reanimator decks want more fat to cheat currently. It is also a Natural Order target. SSS is perhaps in exactly the right place that both green ramp decks will cast him and cheat decks will cheat him. I see him as a more broadly playable card.
–Anguished Unmaking, +Ashen Rider
Another plant for reanimator, this time a more direct one as I don’t expect any deck to ever cast it. This is the sort of card that will wheel for the decks that really want it. Well then, if mana cost isn’t an issue, why this card from all fatness of Magic? Besides the basic requirement of working with all forms of cheat effects, he simply has the highest floor of all options not presently in the cube. Quoting Nick West: “this is the insurance card in the cheat it into play decks”. It will always be good, no matter when, no matter against whom. It keeps you alive, or hurts their mana base. It usually requires removal and still exiles yet another thing when it goes. Both a combo piece and the most versatile of answers. The drawback is that it isn’t very good at finishing the game directly.
Colorless
–Mishra’s Workshop, +Guardian Idol
Workshop is too narrow. You don’t just need many artiacts, you want them to cost 3 or more. The density of that is still too low. A broken card but not playable in this limited format. Idol is just another mana rock. Probably slightly better than Fellwar Stone. A card that can easily be cut later, but will definitely see play in the meanwhile.
–Cursed Scroll, +Chromatic Star
Scroll is very slow and expensive. In aggro decks it is inefficient enough that every burn spell is just better. In control you rarely get to a low hand size. Star is obviously good in artifact decks. It is cheap, perfect for sacrificing and at worst cycles. Should always be playable in weak decks – those that for some reason struggle to get enough cheap playables or have shaky mana bases. Besides artifact decks, this is a card I’d actively want in decks with Emrakul, delve cards, Goyf, etc. My fear is that the card will not read exciting enough for people to maindeck it. It is a filler for sure, but one that can see play in any deck and other cubes had success with the card.
MtG Cube Crafting 