This guest post is written by Rick Cummings. For those wishing to contribute to cubedrafting.com, contact eerwin at gmail dot com.

My name is Rick. I’m from Fort Wayne, IN, before which time I lived in Fargo, ND. My “claim to fame” is that I placed 3rd at the North Dakota Champs this past year, with EsperLark before it was cool (rogue cred: go!) I’ve written a few bloggy bits at TCGPlayer.com. Maybe you’ve read them. Probably you haven’t. But in response to Eric Klug’s commons/uncommons cube article, I thought I’d write the article I’ve been putting off for something like a year now: Building an All-Commons Cube.

By now, the rules and definitions of building a cube are pretty well set, by Mr. Erwin, Tom LaPille, and the rest of the cube community. (The short version: there are no rules.) Certain conventions lay about, here and there, with people professing the play value of Power Nine in a fully-rared-out cube, or maintaining balance or certain strategies amongst the colors and their combinations. There are people that espouse rareless cubes.

I belong to this last group. Fully-powered cubes are fun; there’s no disputing that. But really, there’s a lot of “pure” Magic that doesn’t really get showcased too often in cube matches. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard things like “and then he reanimated Blistering Firecat and I ate 13 damage to lose.” Sure, cube Magic lets you tell sick beatz stories, but is it really that much for engaging, real-world limited Magic with stupidly powerful cards? Not so much.

Most limited formats give you access to a bomb or two, some removal, and some support cards. When every card is a bomb, it’s hard to play limited Magic. In my opinion, of course. That “It’s like constructed Magic, only you draft it!” line is fun the first few times, but after awhile, the Guy with the Turn One Tinker-into-Colossus and the Guy-that-Drafts Mono-Blue and the Ramp-into-Tooth-and-Nail-with-Oath-Backup gets a little silly. Some of us want tight play, incremental advantage, and creature combat that doesn’t involve a Jitte.

So I (and some friends of mine) built an all-commons cube. No Force of Will, no Kokusho, no Tarmogoyf, no Ancestral Recall. But also no Fact or Fiction, no Swords to Plowshares, no Avalanche Riders, no Psychatog.

The benefits to this are as follows:

1. You can use any card that was printed, in a normal expansion, as a common. That means Kird Ape and Atog, and others, get to play. As well as dozens of other overpowered cards that people forget are or were commons.

Ice Age Counterspell

2. You get some really fun pimping options. Personally, my rules for pimping are as follows: Original printings take priority. That means a Limited Edition Dark Ritual gets in over, say, Ice Age. This makes things a little extreme when you’re paying $50 for a common like Counterspell, but it also reminds things about the game’s past that you wouldn’t normally see. If an original printing was foil, its in as foil. If not, tough cookies. If there’s an FNM-versus-Original Foil battle, FNM wins. Occasionally some rules are broken in this regard, like my FNM Wall of Roots, but by and large, this is how I roll for editions. Ninth Edition foils are neat, but I’d much rather play with an Arabian Nights Kird Ape, thanks.

3. You get to play “actual limited Magic”. As I mentioned before, the limited core of advantage and deckbuilding theory apply here, as opposed to a rared cube, where you can feasibly build U/B Upheaval Tog with Meloku backup (which I’ve done, and won a draft with.) While many similar, classic archetypes are viable in commons cube, there are significantly fewer “Oops, I win” moments. Tight play is rewarded a lot more often than sticking an Akroma or getting Survival/Nightmare going. You can play R/G Beats or R/B Burn or U/B control or Mono Green Aggro or some Affinity thing or Storm. But you’re not going to win just because you’re playing an achetype.

4. You can build a cube for a much, much lower budget to start, and costs to maintain it are significantly lower. Rather than having to chase after new rares, you can use your excess commons from drafting a new set to make your additions/deletions.

5. You can take it place to place without having to worry about it. My friend’s full cube is worth thousands of dollars in dual lands, the occasional power card, and chase rares. I bought my cube from StarCityGames (for the most part, anyway) for less than $200. If I lose it or some jerk steals it, I’m out–essentially–nothing but time. Obviously this doesn’t necessarily hold if you have a Beta Counterspell in there.

There are, of course, some downsides:

1. People hear “commons” and “cube” and neurons start misfiring. “What’s the point of cubing if I don’t get to play with Dark Confidant or Kamahl or card x?” The point isn’t so much on playing with broken cards (although a lot of people forget things like Rancor and Blastoderm are common) as it is playing Magic and socializing.

2. There is a lot of redundancy in card selection. To wit: red has an awful lot of burn at common. Blue has a lot of drawing, counters, and bounce. White has a lot of stupid life gain. How you choose which cards of a certain utility make it in versus those that don’t is time consuming and can be frustrating.

Capsize

3. Blue is frustratingly overpowered in some senses. Capsize is the best soft lock in the commons cube, but take it away and all blue really does is annoy the opponent to no end. While we’ve included some good blue dudes–remember what a beating Errant Ephemeron was in TSP limited?–it’s hard to win with mono-blue. This is both a blessing and a curse.

Finally, I offer some general commons cube guidelines for those wishing to build one, in addition to the “normal” cube guidelines:

1. While, thanks to Ravnica, multicolor options and splashing is relatively easy, try to keep your multicolor options to pairs. Playing a UR card is significantly easier than a URB. It’s less of a headache for drafting and deckbuilding.

2. This is a corollary to 1. Hybrid cards are entirely different animals than gold cards. If you’re including both, balance them amongst colors and consider them separately. A UW card and a (U/W) card still play differently, and they go in different decks.

3. I’m not sure if this is “canonical”, but if you’re pimping your cube, try to keep your cards in English. Not everyone knows what every card is on art (especially if you have an alternate-art card). Sometimes playing commons that no one has seen for years (or ever) causes confusion enough even in English. Try to keep it simple. Related to this: if you’re using original edition cards with old templating, make sure everyone knows how the card is worded and/or works with modern templating and rules. It’s also nice to have a copy of Oracle on hand, either on the internet with Gatherer or some other resource. Personally, I have a Windows Mobile phone with PocketMTG running on it.

4. Have fun, and make it your own! The list I’m including is what I consider to be the best build we’ve discovered, but it’s certainly not the best cube it could be, and it might not serve your playgroup.

With all that out of the way, here is my Commons Cube, updated through Shards of Alara. It is 455 cards total, which is enough for a ten-person draft, with 5 cards left over. While I have yet to have a full ten-person table, it handles up to eight people quite well. There are a few different themes and subthemes, with a few different deck archetypes possible, as well as some I probably haven’t seen come out of it.

I direct you here to see/download my cube.

Rick Cummings
rickiep00h on MTGO, Twitter, and literally everywhere else.

Special thanks to Rick for submitting this article. Remember you can submit your own cube articles by contacting me via eerwin (at) gmail (dot) com.