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Andy and Anthony are joined by Jake and Parker to talk about their shifts in approach to each of their eternal cubes. While Jake, Parker, and Andy have long maintained generally “power motivated” eternal cubes, they’ve each grappled with concerns about aesthetics, complexity, or gameplay in the last few years of Magic releases. They talk about how they’ve changed their design philosophies in light of those changes and how they’ve reframed the way they make decisions about the cards they choose to play.

Discussed in this episode:

• Bodleian Cube
• Bun Magic Cube
• Theseus
• Turbo Cube
• Atavus
• Pulp Nouveau
• Midwinter
• Cascade Cascade
• Four TCGs in Magic’s Trench Coat, article by Parker LaMascus

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 2:57 - Main Topic: Power Motivated Cube
• 11:21 - The Vibeshift
• 17:08 - Gameplay Styles
• 19:33 - Paper Drafting and Taste
• 24:41 - Why Play High Power Level Magic
• 30:53 - Stat Inflation
• 39:33 - Power Motivation in 2026
• 45:46 - Theorycrafting with Powerful Cards
• 49:26 - Concluding Games
• 53:14 - Make Your Cube About Something
• 55:57 - Advice

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Riffing on last week’s slightly divisive topic, Andy and Anthony talk about cards in their own cubes that players hate. They comb through their cubes discussing the many reasons players might dislike a card and why they might still be justifiable inclusions.

Discussed in this episode:

• Numberphile
• Episode 307: Hate Cards in Cube
• Sacred Geometry
• Regular Cube
• Bun Magic Cube
• Irregular Cube
• 100 Ornithopters
• Episode 293: The Last Echo of a Boon

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 5:20 - Hated Cards
• 10:00 - What Makes a Card a “Groaner”
• 11:57 - Bun Magic
• 22:52 - Irregular Cube
• 25:37 - Mill
• 28:31 - Silver Border
• 32:02 - Conspiracies
• 36:49 - 100 Ornithopters and Reactive Spells
• 47:30 - Thrumming Stone
• 52:07 - Sacred Geometry
• 57:34 - Regular Cube and Clunky Mana
• 1:02:42 - Neoclassical Cube

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Andy and Anthony talk about hate cards, and how they fit into Cube design in particular. Of course, they start by trying to define the term. They talk through the pros and cons of them and how different types may play a role in Cubes. They go through a number of their own cubes, analyzing them from this perspective.

Discussed in this episode:

• Take 5
• Sacred Geometry
• 100 Ornithopters
• Bun Magic Cube
• Neoclassical Cube
• Turbo Cube
• Regular Cube

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 0:45 - Main Topic: Hate Cards
• 9:15 - Examples of Hate Cards
• 13:05 - Hate Cards We Cube
• 16:09 - Talking About Constructed
• 17:14 - Aura Shards
• 22:09 - Bun Magic Hate Cards
• 23:53 - Teferi, Time Raveler
• 28:38 - Changing the Math vs Hate
• 31:11 - Take Five
• 34:11 - Hate Combos
• 36:30 - Neoclassical Cube
• 38:48 - White in Neoclassical
• 42:00 - Groundseal
• 44:37 - Humility
• 48:47 - Turbo Cube
• 55:39 - Context Shift Hate
• 59:57 - Mailbag
• 1:02:15 - Garfield

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Andy and Anthony scour the cutting room floor for unfinished gems. They offer up some of their half-baked, unfinished cube ideas for you to steal. Andy shares his ideas for an aesthetic sun-bleached cube, a cube where your deck is your life total, and an environment built around wishes. Anthony digs up an all alternate win conditions cube and a battle box where the entire game happens in one stack.

Discussed in this episode:

• Anthony’s Alternate Win Condition Cube
• Anthony’s Single Stack Battle Box
• Creatureless Cube
• Degenerate Microcube
• Loam Cube
• Companion Cube
• Arcane Lessons

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 1:19 - Main Topic: Steal Our Ideas
• 1:57 - Sunbleached Cube
• 6:59 - Alternate Win Cons Cube
• 13:06 - No Life Total Cube
• 24:33 - Where Do Ideas Come From
• 27:33 - Omniscience Battlebox
• 37:24 - Three Wishes Cube
• 49:02 - Custom Ante Cards

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Andy and Anthony are joined by Cube Person of the Year 2024, Ollie, to talk about whether it’s irresponsible to present a cube for drafting without any playtesting. What is the difference between ‘playing’ and ‘playtesting’? Can you design a cube iteratively without playtesting? Just how bad can a cube really be?

Discussed in this episode:

• Upkeep NY/C4AC
• Bodlean Cube
• Creatureless Cube
• Episode 302 — Theory Drafting the Best Decks in Regular Cube
• The Ball Pit
• Episode 206 — The Joy of Gaming with Richard Garfield
• 100 Ornithopters
• Marina Abramovic - The Artist is Present (2010)
• Boston Cube Party

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 3:41 - Secret Project: Obscura
• 9:13 - Playtesting
• 16:46 - The Case Against Playtesting
• 21:03 - Non-Playtest Data
• 23:09 - The Process
• 29:45 - Playing Vs Playtesting
• 35:17 - Cube First Impressions
• 43:33 - Expectations
• 47:28 - Designing for an Experience
• 52:10 - Marina Abramovic and Artistic Intent
• 58:26 - Logistics

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Andy and Anthony are joined by the de facto Cube judge — Bones! The three recap The Salt Box, a small Cube event in Baltimore. At this event, Andy debuted Take Five and Judge Bones Arcane Lessons. They share what they learned from players drafting their cubes for the very first time and their own experience as cube designers drafting cubes for the first time in a public event.

Discussed in this episode:

• Salt Box
• Take 5
• Take 5 Youtube Videos
• Arcane Lessons
• Bones on Cube Cobra
• Changeling Cube
• Sacred Geometry
• Regular Cubehttps://cubecobra.com/cube/about/regular?view=primer
• Kulashov Cube
• The Wetlands
• The Red Terror
• Magic History with Bones and Deinonychus

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 0:00 - Special Guest Judge Bones
• 5:11 - Arcane Lessons
• 11:31 - Debuting Arcane Lessons
• 15:38 - Lesson/Learn
• 17:19 - Arcane
• 19:35 - Iteration
• 21:12 - Lessons Learned
• 29:09 - Take Five Debut
• 42:45 - Designing Cubes for Events
• 47:35 - Take Five Feedback
• 51:48 - Anthony’s Salt Box Highlights
• 60:08 - Fun Judge Calls with Judge Bones

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Andy and Anthony are joined by returning guest Zach Barash. They talk about about different lenses Cube designers can use to approach designing a new cube. They finish on a pack 1, pick 1 from Andy’s new cube Take Five.

Previous episodes with Zach:

• 001 The Principles of Game Design
• 002 On Terminology, Communication, and Community
• 003 Reflections on Cube Drafts Past
• 004 Building Skill vs. Building Community and Learning from Your Mistakes
• 005 Playtesting and Cube Feedback

Discussed in this episode:

• Upkeep NY
• Episode 197: Cube Design Iron Chef: Goblin Charbelcher
• Episode 182: Emergent Cube Design by Example

Cubes referenced:

• Bun Magic Cube
• Cascade Cube
• Turbo Cube
• Reading Rainbow
• Sacred Geometry
• The Ball Pit
• Companion Cube
• Perilous Seas
• Dichotomy Cube
• UMA+ Cube
• Take Five

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 1:27 - Guest: Zach Barash
• 4:59 - Lenses for Approaching Cube Design
• 14:12 - Making a “Good Cube”
• 15:05 - Duplication
• 19:28 - Balance
• 24:13 - Homage
• 25:18 - Powermaxing Diversion
• 33:39 - Novelty
• 37:14 - Balancing Goals vs Taste
• 42:01 - Icebergs
• 46:11 - Restrictions
• 51:33 - Head vs Heart
• 53:43 - Summary
• 58:01 - Crack-a-Pack of Take Five

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Andy and Anthony and joined by Adam, a local player who suggested a novel way to cube. All players involved built what they thought would be the best deck that could ever be drafted from Anthony’s Regular Cube. They talked about the decks they built, their processes for building, and what it revealed about an environment which is typically intended to be drafted.

Discussed in this episode:

• Regular Cube
• Super Magic Fun Time
• Degenerate Microcube

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 1:27 - Main Topic: Theory Draft with Adam
• 7:48 - RW Heroic
• 18:04 - Metagaming
• 23:50 - Anthony’s Zombie Deck
• 26:58 - Comparing Draft, Constructed, and Rotisserie
• 29:25 - Premium Removal
• 31:03 - Mana
• 34:31 - More Theorydrafting
• 40:17 - Meta Shifts
• 42:51 - Andy’s Ninjas Deck
• 46:04 - Splashes
• 51:05 - Anthony’s WG Landfall Deck
• 53:51 - Adam’s Mono B Zombies
• 54:32 - Sideboards
• 1:03:23 - Reevaluations
• 1:05:41 - The Control Deck
• 1:08:31 - Final Thoughts

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Following their previous episode about playing with Young Pyromancer Andy and Anthony talk about how to win with proactive green decks. They look back at some of Anthony’s successful decks and try to get some insight into what makes them tick, exploring card types and distribution and gameplay heuristics.

Discussed in this episode:

• Deck Photos
• Episode 299: How to Win with Young Pyromancer
• Episode 260: The ABC’s of Midrange
• Red Terror

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 4:33 - Main Topic: How to Play Green
• 6:39 - Andy’s Midrange Woes
• 12:05 - Mana Curve & Mulligans
• 14:28 - Being the Beatdown
• 20:58 - Combat & Blocking
• 29:37 - Card Evaluation
• 34:44 - Synergy
• 39:23 - More Mana Curve
• 40:42 - Cantrips
• 43:54 - Grindy Cards & Flexibility
• 46:07 - Manlands
• 48:44 - Summary
• 52:53 - Mailbag

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Celebrating 300 episodes, Andy and Anthony answer listener submitted questions. They address their favorite gummy candies, opinions on the free will of jellyfish, the most technologically advanced things they could build from scratch on a desert island, and so much more.

Discussed in this episode:

• Arena Cube
• Shoebox
• Shrimp Welfare Project
• Erich’s Packing Center
• Sockerbit
• Go Bidet

Books:

• A Pattern Language,by Christopher Alexander
• A People’s History of the United States) by Howard Zinn
• Frostbite by Nicola Twilley
• Cod by Mark Kurlansky
• The Design of Everythings by Donald Norman
• Thomas Thwaites, who attempted to make a toaster from scratch

Artists:

• Yayoi Kusama
• Julie Mehretu
• Robert Hodgin
• Impressionism
• wayne thiebaud
• Isaac Leviton
• Gustave Doré
• Virgil Finlay
• Theo Jansen
• Dan Flavin
• Richard Serra
• James Turrell

Other Media:

• NTS Radio
• Off Menu, Podcast hosted by Ed Gamble and James Acaster
• Alone, TV Show

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please consider backing Lucky Paper on Patreon or leaving us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

• Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
• Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

You can find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord. Send in questions to the show at [email protected] or our p.o. box:

Lucky Paper
PO Box 4855
Baltimore, MD 21211

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Timestamps

• 0:00 - Intro
• 4:18 - Episode 300 Q&A!
• 5:03 - Origins of Lucky Paper and the Podcast
• 8:45 - Shoebox
• 10:24 - Do Jellyfish Have Free Will?
• 12:26 - Being Opinionated
• 13:31 - Processed Cheese
• 21:00 - Pinatas
• 23:35 - What do you admire most about each other?
• 24:44 - Life Improvements
• 29:49 - Influential Books
• 34:21 - Who Could Build a More Technologically Advanced Thing?
• 40:21 - FMK
• 41:28 - Cube Soundtracks
• 46:04 - Non Magic LPR Listeners
• 49:15 - Higher Education
• 53:09 - Survival Reality Television
• 57:45 - Our Ideal High Speed Transit
• 59:13 - Visual Art
• 1:03:03 - Our Hosts First Impressions of Each Other
• 1:10:53 - The Future of Cube
• 1:17:52 - Hopes for Baltimore Cubing
• 1:22:33 - Mailbag
• 1:24:19 - Favorite Drinks