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

I have a confession to make- I’m a magic player without a playgroup. I’ve recently moved across the country, and my magic-playing community consists of myself and my boyfriend. The good news is that the cube is a great format for two. Here are my tips for designing and playing the cube with less than 8 people, and my observations of how a smaller group changes the format.

Stick to Limited

Nearly all of the cards in the cube should be playable in every deck of their color. In other words, your cube shouldn’t be made up of combo pieces or cards that rely strongly on finding the cards that go with them. For example, would you play Entomb in a deck without reanimation? Of course not. But not every black deck will be a dedicated Reanimator deck. Likewise, would you want Darksteel Colossus if you didn’t have Tinker? There is a reason that the Colossus is a late pick even in M10 limited.  If you include too many cards like this, there will be more dead cards and the overall power level of your decks will decrease- and that’s not the point of the cube! This piece of advice is relevant for any cube, but it really becomes necessary if you intend to draft with two or four people. Since you see fewer cards – we draft with 100 for two people – you have less of a chance of seeing combo pieces with their other halves. A good rule of thumb is that every card should have been good (or great!) in its limited format. Furthermore, it’s worthwhile to limit cards that require a very strong commitment to one color, since virtually all decks in small-group drafts will be at least two colors. Some cards are worth the commitment- Sacred Mesa and Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir come to mind- but too many cards like that make decks hard to build.

Emphasize Utility Effects

It goes without saying that some pretty broken things can happen in the cube. Turn 2 Sphinx of the Steel Wind? Turn 1 Library of Alexandria? Sometimes, that is going to be game over, but it doesn’t have to be. The solution is to make sure utility effects like creature and artifact removal are plentiful, and LD is present especially in green and red, since those decks can otherwise have trouble fighting control. It’s a good idea to articulate what a deck of a certain color should always have and then include that effect at a high level. For example, I want nearly every white and black deck to have efficient spot removal, and every green deck to have some sort of ramp or land fetch. The downside is that some spots in your cube are going to be devoted to less-than-sexy effects like Naturalize or Scrabbling Claws. However, those effects are absolutely vital to fighting otherwise game-ending cards like Recurring Nightmare or Jitte. Our cube used to run Apocalypse Hydra as a big, must-answer monster. Recently, we replaced it with Vithian Renegades. Is that a strict increase in power level? No. But it makes it more likely that red/green decks will have a way to deal with problem cards like Icy Manipulator or Forcefield.

Watch the Curve

The last few times a new set has been spoiled, there has been a really cool white creature at the high end. We thought about both Iona, Shield of Emeria and Admonition Angel for the cube. However, the reality is that our cube doesn’t lack for high-end white finishers. Until there is a white creature strong enough to replace something that is already there, it’s unlikely that a creature that costs 5 or more is going into white. It’s valuable to know what the average cost in each color is to help you make informed decisions about what can go in and what can’t. When we calculated the average CMC in black, we found it was surprising low and that we were able to add another big monster. Likewise, it’s important to keep in mind what each color lacks. For example, I’m constantly on the lookout for good early red creatures for the cube, since we’ve struggled to find ones that feel strong.

The Game Determines the Archetypes

There is a delicate balance in the cube- the choice between playing to each color’s strengths, and including unique effects that stretch the bounds of what that color is allowed to do. In the cube, it’s important to do both. However, you’ll find that if you just choose the best cards, you will naturally accomplish both goals. For example, just by including excellent cards, your cube will support white weenie, reanimator, and both control and aggro-control in blue- that’s just the reality of what Wizards has printed for those colors. You’ll also want to include the strong out-of-color effects, like Harmonize, Magma Jet, and Damnation.

However, there is a difference between supporting an archetype and enabling decks that look exactly like constructed decks. The cube is still a limited format, and the chances that you will have a white weenie deck of entirely one- and two-drops and Crusade effects are slim. Forcing that possibility means doing so at the expense of white control archetypes, which are also intrinsically really strong. The cube produces incredibly powerful decks, but that is not the same as producing exact copies of constructed decks. This is especially true in two –player drafts, where all decks tend to be slightly midrange because of the smaller cardpool. Don’t try too hard to do so, and you’ll end up with more variety and more interesting decks and games.

When you can support more than one archetype with one card, do so! Cards that fit into control and aggro archetypes are gold. One of the prime examples of this is Vendilion Clique. Some other examples I’m fond of are Brigid, Hero of Kinsbaile, Pestermite, Swans of Bryn Argoll, and Aether Vial.

If you’re in the position of playing the cube with a small group, take advantage of the benefits this offers. When we draft, we usually play to best of five (the official games) and then as many more as we like. When we used to play with more people, it was sometimes frustrating to have a disproportionate number of mulligans or lack of lands knock you out of a match without ever really getting to play your deck. With just two people, that virtually never happens, and we usually play enough games to experience all the strange interactions and powerful effects the cube offers.

How to Play

We’ve developed a pretty good system of drafting with two people, so I thought I would share it here. First, our cube is divided into nine sections- five colors, artifacts, multicolor, hybrid, and land. We take ten cards from each section at random, and then add an additional ten cards selected randomly from any pile. This means that we have a bit more variety in terms of which colors are supported in a given draft. After these cards have been shuffled thoroughly, we do a “Let’s Make a Deal” draft. We put one card each in three piles, face down, then one person looks at the first pile. They can either take that card or add one from the stack of remaining cards to the pile and look at the second pile. If after the third pile, they haven’t taken a pile, they take one card off the top of the stack. Then it’s the other person’s turn to repeat the process. In this way, you simulate the normal draft process of seeing some but not all the cards the other person takes, and retain the ability to hate-draft, which is pretty crucial in the cube.

Recently, we’ve decided that it is advantageous to go second while drafting. You have the potential when you go second to see more cards, and have an idea of what the other person is not drafting. I’m not completely sure on that point, though. If you have any thoughts, I’d love to hear them. Thanks for reading!

- Thea Steele
http://crib-swap.blogspot.com/

Special thanks to Thea Steele for sending this in! – Evan