Hello and welcome to the Magic Super Cube!

If you didn’t know, this is the blog where I go through the sets of Magic and from the sets that were Standard legal or would have been Standard legal at the time I choose cards from those sets and amass a massive Cube from each of those choices.

We finish Odyssey block by taking a look at Judgement, a small set of 143 cards that, in order to make up for more black cards being in the previous set, we have more green and white cards in the set because they are the enemy colors. The experiment of having more of one or a couple of colors is interesting in theory, but in practice seems like it wasn’t successful to try again in the future.

The picks this time were very easy, and even though we are going back to five picks for each color because of no artifacts, we actually have a couple of multicolored options to pick from and have enough room for the only lands in the set.

Let’s get started!

White

It continues to surprise me on how easy it has been picking cards from these sets, and it feels like Magic as a game is starting to come into its own in defining some interesting cards.

Among those interesting cards are two cycles of cards that will be seen in each color, one from the creatures being a creature that has some sort of effect in the graveyard. The other creature pick for white is another creature that has an ability from the graveyard that can be a way to protect you things for a turn.

The other cycle of cards comes from the noncreature spells, and it is a cycle of cards that was inspired by a card from Arabian Nights and allows you to pull a card from outside the game. The other noncreature spells for white is a card that gets you some tokens in play and an interesting way to have a discard outlet in white that has some interesting downsides.

My picks for white are Battle Screech, Glory, Golden Wish, Solitary Confinement, and Valor.

Blue

When we come into blue, I would say that this was the most difficult of the five colors to make picks from.

This mostly derived from the creature spells, which has been a fairly common trend for blue, and there was the easy choice of the creature that was part of the graveyard cycle of cards. The other creature stumped me for a bit, but in the end I decided on a creature that worked as an interesting toolbox creature that had evasion, could get damage through, and was a discard outlet as well.

The noncreature spells, barring the one from the cycle, also proved to be a bit difficult because there were some pretty solid options to choose from. I decided that card that rewarded you for playing a blue heavy deck by letting you draw a ton of cards and a way to help add a bit of a theft archetype to the Cube as a whole.

My picks for blue are Cephalid Inkshrouder, Cunning Wish, Flash of Insight, Spelljack, and Wonder.

Black

Despite black having the fewest options among the five colors in this set, it wasn’t that difficult to pick cards for the color, I would probably say that it was the easiest of the five to choose from.

While I did pick the creature that followed the cycle of creatures to help fill out the number of creatures for the Cube, the other was a creature that was pricier than I expected, but there was definitely a good reason for it being that price, especially since it synergizes well with red and graveyard based strategies.

The noncreature spells were also very easy to pick from. Barring the card from the cycle, the other noncreature choices include a way to get some information from an opponent’s hand while also potentially having them discard a card and a way to either get a creature into your hand or be a way to reanimate a big creature if you happen to have Threshold.

My picks for black are Balthor the Defiled, Cabal Therapy, Death Wish, Filth, and Stitch Together.

Red

Red was pretty tough to make choices for, and while not the most difficult of the five colors, it did come close by virtue of there being some pretty easy picks for each of the colors.

Of course there was the creature of the graveyard cycle as one of the choices, but there was a bit of difficulty in choosing another creature. I ended up choosing a creature that plays a bit similarly to a previously picked creature, but also plays into being a bit more aggressive than that creature by having first strike as well as haste.

The noncreature spells were also a bit tough to pick from, but aside from the cycle pick, I ended up picking a burn spell that has a bit of recursion for the price of a land and a spell that plays into a chaotic deck that can also serve as a control piece if luck is in your favor.

My picks for red are Anger, Burning Wish, Jeska, Warrior Adept, Lava Dart, and Planar Chaos.

Green

Green was pretty easy overall to pick from, but was just shy of being the easiest color to pick from because I decided on a last minute change.

This came from the creature side of things, not from the cycle pick but rather from what I originally picked as a ramp piece to a different sort of ramp piece that is cheaper to cast and allows you to cheat a land into play by sacrificing it.

The noncreature choices, not including the cycle pick, are pretty interesting for green to have. One is a way to give a creature a boost but can also make a creature token in case that creature dies and a way for green to get an extra turn spell if some very specific criteria are met.

My picks for green are Brawn, Elephant Guide, Krosan Wayfarer, Living Wish, and Seedtime.

Multicolor and Lands

There were not too many options for multicolored cards and lands, so I am combining them.

To start with the easy selection, I ended up picking all of the lands that were introduced in this set. This includes a land that provides a unique bit of fixing if it is in your graveyard, a slow fetch land that gets two lands from your library and puts them into play, and a land that can become a pretty decent creature if you need it in a pinch.

The multicolored spells are where I had to make a couple of interesting cuts, because there were four options to pick from while I only had two spots remaining. I knew that I wanted the card that was not only an anthem but also a mana doubler for your lands, but the other choice was a bit more difficult. In the end, I decided that a card that allowed you to cheat creatures in play would be solid, but it is a bit of work to get it to do so to make things a bit more interesting.

My multicolored picks are Hunting Grounds and Mirari’s Wake, and my land picks are Krosan Verge, Nantuko Monastery, and Riftstone Portal.

In Conclusion

Judgement concludes Odyssey block, and a surprising number of easy choices. This block is by far the easiest to have picked cards from out of all previous blocks, and I can only hope that this bodes well for the future.

That’s because we are going to be starting Onslaught block, which is a block that focuses on typal strategies, which means we can either help define previous typal strategies or potentially introduce some new ones to the fold.

As usual, here is the Moxfield link to keep up with all the cards in the Cube!

See you next time!

Peace,

From, J.M. Casual

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