So the weekend after the most recent episode of The Third Power in which we interviewed Stuart Fleisher (@splitcardcube on Twitter), I traveled over to The Gaming Pit in Lilburn, GA for a GP trial to trade and Cube and whatever else people do at Magic events when they aren’t playing in the main event. And to my pleasure, who would I meet there but Stuart himself, with the Split Card Cube in tow!
After playing some DC10 with my Cube until we had enough people to actually draft, we picked up a couple of regulars from Stuart’s group and off we went into the land of brain explosions!
In my opening pack I had some powerful options, such as 2 different Swords of X and Y, but I decided to draft the Fact or Fiction/Venser, Shaper Savant instead. With a powerful card draw spell that is splashable and a very good ‘I’m playing blue’ spell on the other, I decided I would simplify my draft and try to draft mono-blue after seeing Jace, the Mind Sculptor/Bribery in the next pack (Jace is Jace, and Bribery seems better when even more cards are creatures than usual). Here’s my deck:
Highlights:
– I would up with a small white splash for Geist of St. Traft and Swords to Plowshares, made pretty easy by the Top, Thirst, Flooded Strand, Mox Diamond, Ancestral Visions, Merfolk Looter, Jace…
– Speaking of Top, Counterbalance/Top was fairly easy to assemble and is WAY more powerful than it is usually. It helps when the Top itself can count as both a 1 and a 2. Often during games I would float 3-6 mana costs on top and lock out almost every spell my opponents could cast.
– Karakas is nice when four of your creatures are Geist, Vendilion Clique, Venser, and Keiga.
– Going into pack three, I really wanted to see a Vedalken Shackles for my deck. Imagine my pleasure when I saw it…with Time Walk attached to it! (Never cast Time Walk, btw…Shackles is too good!)
I wound up going 3-0 with the deck, and never felt like I was out of a game. While I did have some very close games vs. Stuart, I never felt as though the games were out of my control. I CB/Top locked every opponent at one point or another, and every time I did it felt completely unfair. I seriously felt like I was playing a constructed deck, and part of that was having twice as many cards in my deck as usual due to the awesomeness of having all these split cards!
Overall I had a great time! Stuart was great to meet (he even stopped cubing for a bit to help a new player learn how to play Magic!), and the Cube really is an experience in card evaluation. I would highly suggest making one of your own or playing with a local one if it exists (I know now of one in Atlanta, St. Louis, and Philadelphia). I’m looking forward to doing it again soon! Let’s just hope that my own Cube still seems as impressive with only half the cards in my deck…
-AA
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