Ixalan is a set that's between Amonkhet and Hour of Devastation for Cube cards, since there are a lot of tribal cards that don't really do anything in the format.

Of note: Although this set review is being released after the prerelease and the Magic Online release, know that these evaluations are based on actual play in my Cube and not merely outsourced to playing at these events. If I'm saying a card has been working well based on my experience, it's based on actual experience from trying them out in my Cube and finding the cards have been working well/poorly in my Cube.

As usual, I'll break this down by mechanic.

Raid

Chart a Course doesn't officially have raid but it just about does. There are a lot of cards for Blue tempo decks in this set for pirates, this block's iteration of Faeries, but I've found that it works well in just about any Blue deck. I don’t expect this will be two mana to draw to very often due to Blue control decks typically having a low creature count and not really being interested in attacking, unless the coast is clear or they want to get in chip shots against Planeswalkers. However, even in those worst-case scenarios, I've found that it works similarly to something like See Beyond, and if it can get “raid”, it becomes absurd. Blue draw spells generally don't tend to get printed that can stack up to Cube standards, with exceptions like Pull from Tomorrow and Dig through Time. This is one of the best cards in the set and it's one I'd highly recommend trying out, as I've been impressed by it.

Ruin Raider is a great Black aggro tool as a riff on Dark Confidant. Most of these tended to not work out very well, with the exception of Asylum Visitor, and not having evasion doesn't do him any favors since he falls in the “saboteurs without evasion” trope. However, triggering off of other attacking creatures is a different story. I've found you usually get to draw at least one card, but since it's an end-of-turn draw, sometimes it's hard to cash in that value, especially for decks that generally want to deploy their threats or removal on their turn. Turns out Black doesn't really have cube-worthy flash creatures. Black attacking 3-drops aren't incredibly deep, but this is a nice tool to supplement those decks because, despite the drawbacks I've noted, it generally pays out in card advantage.

Repeating Barrage is a riff on Thunderblade Charge which hasn't been cubeable since the late 2000s. It's a pretty rough sell because Red burn has only gotten better since then (as Volcanic Hammers were acceptable back in the day, but the rate is too inefficient now.)

Rigging Runner is a riff on Skarrgan Pit-Skulk (notice a theme?) where it has a converted mana cost of one but isn't really a 1-drop. As Alex Ullman noted years ago, much like Skarrgan Pit-Skulk, it's more of a “curve hole filler” than an actual 1-drop and thus should be viewed accordingly. If you're going to include this in your Cube, I'd probably consider another replacement than just another 1-drop. My impressions of it were lukewarm after testing. It is merely okay for Cube.

Enrage

This mechanic is somewhat like Afflict, a way to discourage blocking by punishing the opponent for doing so (with creatures with 1+ power.) There are some ways to trigger it yourself — mainly Red symmetrical damage spells and some cards like Walking Ballista.

Ripjaw Raptor is the best card with Enrage in the set due to its solid, but not absurd, Erhnam Djinn stats. Having five toughness lets it live though Wildfires and medium sized Earthquake style effects. Unlike some recent 4-mana creatures that survive Wildfire/Burning of Xinye, like Goldnight Castigator, this is actually good. When I've seen it played, it’s often in decks that are base Green and in non-Gruul color combinations like Golgari and Simic. Cards like Vizier of the Menagerie have been in consideration for Cubes mainly because Green 4-drops have been pretty weak overall. This isn't absurd, like Master of the Wild Hunt, but it's a fine inclusion as an attacker with a solid rate, but one that I wouldn't be surprised was cut from many Cubes in a year if Green 4-drops get better.

Raptor Hatchling — Having played Brindle Shoat in my Pauper Cube since it was downshifted in Vintage Masters, I'm not even convinced that this is better than Brindle Shoat, a card which hardly sees play in Cubes with rares in them. Raptor Hatchling is in a color that appreciates a 3/3 (and in this case, trampler) but it's a bit too low impact for aggressive decks on the front side, and the 3/3 may not even come if the hatchling is dealt with through other means.

Explore

All of that being said, it's closer to something like scrying, where hitting a land gets it out of the way in the best way possible. It is generally the worst outcome for those cards, but it's still a fine fail-case scenario.

With all of those words being spent, there's only one card that's really Cubeworthy with Explore, Merfolk Branchwalker since it has a great rate when it comes to pure efficiency. While Green ramp decks aren't in the market for this, it's a solid card for dekcs with a more aggressive lean, even moreso for aggressive midrange decks, since it helps to get rid of bad draws on top of its rate. Green also tends to be one of the better colors to utilize excess mana through equipment and cards like Polukranos, World Eater.

Cards like Emissary of Sunrise are better than people think, but due to competition with White 3-drop rares, it's a tough sell for Cube.

Flip Lands

Legion's Landing; was a card I initially thought was bad, but after trying it out more, I did an About Face and realized it was great. In card evaluation, we've been trained to find specific card combinations as a pipe dream (getting Archangel of Thune/Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit + Kitchen Finks + a sac outlet at the same time in Cube) but understanding common game states and scenarios is much more useful and accurate.

My initial comparisons to Kytheon, Hero of Akros, I don't tend to see that flipped too often, led me to think it a poor card, a weak riff on Sacred Cat; but, I tried it out and was impressed. Why? Much like Hangarback Walker, it wasn't just one individual piece, but how it performed as a whole.

For illustrative purposes, here's a 3-0 deck that ran it pretty well:

Legion?s Landing Deck ? Cube | Usman Jamil

• Creatures (11)
• 1 Abbot of Keral Keep
• 1 Adanto Vanguard
• 1 Captain Lannery Storm
• 1 Dryad Militant
• 1 Earthshaker Khenra
• 1 Glory-Bound Initiate
• 1 Grim Lavamancer
• 1 Imperial Recruiter
• 1 Stoneforge Mystic
• 1 Zurgo Bellstriker
• 1 Territorial Hellkite

• Planeswalkers (2)
• 1 Huatli, Warrior Poet
• 1 Koth of the Hammer

• Instants (4)
• 1 Incinerate
• 1 Lightning Bolt
• 1 Lightning Strike
• 1 Searing Blaze

• Sorceries (2)
• 1 Firebolt
• 1 Kari Zev's Expertise

• Enchantment (1)
• 1 Legion's Landing

• Artifacts (5)
• 1 Batterskull
• 1 Bloodforged Battle-Axe
• 1 Bonesplitter
• 1 Heirloom Blade
• 1 Sword of Feast and Famine

• Lands (15)
• 7 Plains
• 8 Mountain

Buy This Deck

The person who drafted it found it wasn't too hard to flip since it was typically accompanied by other aggressive 1- and 2-drops.

It's true the lifelink isn't super useful in an aggro deck — cards like Adanto Vanguard, Porcelain Legionnaire, and Gitaxian Probe can utilize additional life as a resource, but most of the time, aggro decks don't care that much about it.

There's another argument that it's pretty slow for aggressive decks once it's flipped. Kjeldoran Outpost, the most obvious analogue, was mostly played either in White aggro decks or control decks that ran it as one of their sole win cons. However, this mode has helped the player create additional bodies once the game goes long or after a wrath, and while it's not incredibly cost-efficient, it's a nice use of fallow resources if the game gets to that point. Oddly, the mana acceleration of it impressed me since it allows decks to go slightly bigger if need be —I've seen it help to accelerate bigger plays like Territorial Hellkite and Sword of Feast and Famine + equipping something. It's not an angle that you'd think of with aggressive decks, but being able to get a free mana from the flipped enchantment has been surprisingly useful.

All in all, I was pretty impressed by it, not only in that deck, but in other aggressive decks. It's not a staple by any means, but it's a great card to supplement both White aggro decks and midrange decks that go wide, like Selesnya.

Search for Azcanta plays well into Blue's game plan of going long and is one of the cheaper scry-ish engines. The closest card that really compares is Thassa, God of the Sea. Whenever I saw Thassa played across multiple Cubes, it didn't tend to be a creature very often. Turning into a land that essentially Jayemdae Tomes for gas is something that most Blue decks are in the market for. I found when Blue control decks are able to reach the later stages of the game, they're able to flip it pretty easily off of the scry-ish ability, but it tended to get sideboarded out if the games ended quickly. It's odd that Blue got both this and Chart a Course for cheap card selection and if it absolutely came down to one, it'd be Chart a Course, but don't sleep on Search for Azcanta.

Vance's Blasting Cannons is an odd one since its base mode is similar to Outpost Siege, albeit with a few drawbacks since it can't play lands and can't go into Dragons mode. Its flip trigger works on an axis that typically isn't utilized in Cube, let alone Red aggro decks, by flipping on three spells being cast. Although Outpost Siege has fallen by the wayside in many Cubes due to cards like Chandra, Pyromaster and Chandra, Torch of Defiance, Vance's Blasting Cannons has been better than either card for aggressive decks as a curve topper, since it allows the player to sandbag a few cards in order to get strong late-game inevitability, if need be.

Words of War and Rivalry work on the same axis as Sulfuric Vortex to close the game out close the game out, but suffered because they were pretty poor if the opponent wasn’t going to die soon. This performs that role better. It hasn't come up very often, but being able to represent a constant damage source that's hard to kill in Cube has been a great addition to Red aggro decks. Midrange and control decks haven't really used it much, but that doesn't tarnish its quality.

Growing Rites of Itlimoc has similar issues as other cards that ask you to look at the top X cards. Those lose a lot of their luster in Cube since their selection ability is limited and they often just cantrip (like Augur of Bolas.) It sounds odd to say that my main issue with Growing Rites of Itlimoc is that its enter the battlefield trigger is too costly and too inconsistent to be worth using, since the rates are about the same for Green ramp decks as they are in Blue control decks, especially given the praise given to Azcanta, the Sunken Ruin, but it may be that the Blue version is not as reliant on hitting something since Azcanta can provide multiple attempts to hit something. As a virtual second Gaea's Cradle once it flips (which mostly happened either in Green ramp decks with a lot of mana elf acceleration or token decks), it helps those decks accelerate into big-mana plays, but overall, I felt that the lackluster front side made it a hard sell for Cube.

Arguel's Blood Fast is a riff on Greed or Erebos, God of the Dead, as it's the cheapest way to draw cards on a Black enchantment of this type. The costs are just too steep, though. It turning into a marginally better Miren, the Moaning Well isn't a great payoff either, which means this is not making it into many Cubes.

Treasure Map doesn't do that much on its own when it comes into play, and it's tempting to just dismiss it as Darksteel Pendant, since getting tthree uses out of it seems like a pipe dream. Much like Search for Azcanta, I've found decks looking to go long don't really have a problem doing this, and the payoff of being able to cash the three treasure tokens in for additional cards has been a great boon for non-aggro decks. Although it does work with other treasures, it doesn't really need other treasure producers, as getting three cards for your value is still great.

A lot of artifacts in Cube tend to be for non-aggro decks, as aggro decks don't really care for things like Mind Stone, Coalition Relic, and things like Wurmcoil Engine. Treasure Map doesn't break this trend, but I've found it to be a nice addition for the non-aggro decks.

The other flip lands don't give enough payoff for the resources that they request, like Primal Amulet's multiple spells and Conqueror's Galleon requiring 4 crew.

Treasure!

Captain Lannery Storm was, like Carnage Tyrant, a card that was initially spoiled several months ago. It caught my eye around the same time that Ahn-Crop Crasher did; as a 3-power attacking creature for aggro decks. Recent cards like Ahn-Crop Crasher and Pia Nalaar have worked to put less pressure on attacking 3-drops; and although my initial thoughts on her were lukewarm, she's worked well in aggressive decks. Like with Legion's Landing, getting a free source of mana is great, and when Treasures are cracked mid-combat for a cheap removal spell to get a blocker out of the way, it's pretty absurd. It's still great if it's doing an aggro deck's impression of a Coalition Relic, getting six mana out of two attack cycles or accelerating out a Glorybringer or a Thundermaw Hellkite. I've found that her worst case is that she ends up being a 3/2 attacker with haste, which is still a good overall rate.

Due to this, she comes pretty well recommended, but like with Ripjaw Raptor, may end up being replaced if competition catches up to her.

Planeswalkers

Jace, Cunning Castaway has been underrated since he doesn't fit the mold of previous Jace Planeswalkers — as a card advantage engine for control decks, typically through direct card draw. Jace's +1 doesn't draw, and only loots once, even if attacking with multiple creatures (double strike instances aside.) Like with Chart a Course, Blue control decks aren't really in the market to attack unless the coast is clear or to get in chip shots against Planeswalkers, so in generic Blue control decks, it doesn't really do much.

Although the drawback on his illusion looks prohibitive, most spells that usually would target the illusion would kill it anyway. Looking at the CubeTutor 450-card average, only Arc Trail and Fire // Ice are cards where the drawback is really relevant. Although Planeswalker ultimates generally aren't a huge part of the equation, one element of Jace is that his ultimate happens very quickly (as fast as Koth of the Hammer) and multiples quickly spiral out of control since it's difficult to kill the copies that get created and they can then start making an army of illusions fairly easily.

Generic Blue control decks haven't really used it too much since the +1 doesn't help their gameplan much and, like some other Blue cards in this set, tend to favor Blue decks that are in the market for attacking more quickly than the average Blue deck, but that aspect of it could just be underrated since this one doesn't provide direct card advantage and creating an illusion to protect him comes at a steep loyalty cost. That said, it's a pretty solid, but not absurd value engine.

Vraska, Relic Seeker is better than you may think — ironically, Elspeth, Sun's Champion was underrated because of the only other 6-mana Planeswalker being mediocre (Garruk, Caller of Beasts) — and Chandra, Flamecaller was underrated because she didn't compare all that well to Elspeth (thus showing the dangers of evaluating solely on this context.)

On her own, Vraska starts with a ton of loyalty if a 2/2 menacer is created and then threatens to either kill troublesome non-land and non-Planeswalker threats or threaten a quick ultimate. 6-mana cards are a weak spot for both Green and Black since their options are shallow and I found Vraska was a great value engine that shifted the game toward her once resolved in a way Garruk, Apex Predator never could. However, competition can make it difficult to include her in a Cube.

Huatli, Warrior Poet suffers from being a Planeswalker similar to Ajani Goldmane by having one good ability and a few mediocre abilities that don't impact the board very much. Her ability to spam out Dinosaurs isn't quite enough to make up for her other abilities being mediocre, making her stack up poorly even amongst her Boros Planeswalker brethren, let alone cards like Lightning Helix.

Others

I've found it to be a marquee card for Green ramp decks, as it required an immediate answer or things would go badly for the opponent. It's weird because it's essentially a Mono-Green Sagu Mauler with a few knobs turned (+1/+0, can't be countered) but I never really found Sagu Mauler to be competitive with other Simic cards, yet Carnage Tyrant already has made quite an impact in my and other Cubes. It could be the additional power or the fact it can’t be countered that helped make it an actually good anti-control card, unlike Great Sable Stag and Grand Abolisher, both of which suffered because they protected themselves poorly and weren't very efficient.

Most 6-mana creatures don't tend to stack up well compared to the Titan cycle, with Blue having cards that compete with and exceed its titan (Consecrated Sphinx, Aetherling, Torrential Gearhulk.) The other colors fare much worse, with cards like the Kamigawa dragon cycle (which haven't aged all that well) and cards like Combustible Gearhulk, Rorix Bladewing and others. Green has come closer than the others with cards like Greenwarden of Murasa and Regal Behemoth, but even these were a ways away from Prime Time.

Carnage Tyrant is the only one that really goes toe-to-toe with Prime Time and it's a pretty easy include for most Cubes. I've found it's worked well as a marquee ramp target and overall great must-deal with for Green decks.

Dimir finds itself in the same situation as Izzet did before Dack Fayden and Ral Zarek where there isn't a God-tier card that's head and shoulders above the rest, but a smattering of solidly good cards.

It's hard to say if Hostage Taker fits the bill of God-tier Dimir card, but it's a card that I've been extremely impressed with and would say that if it's not the best Dimir card, it's very close.

As mentioned with Legion's Landing, there aren't many ways to utilize life as a resource in White and this is one of them.

Look back to that deck shown with Legion's Landing, which also featured Adanto Vanguard. I asked the drafter if Adanto Vanguard performed better than Glory-Bound Initiate and he said that overall, it was better from his deck, which matched experiences from drafters from that point forward. Four life is a very real cost and utilizing it on defense generally isn't worth it, but it's gravy on top of it being able to protect itself in scenarios where it's worth the life exchange, especially in matchups where life can be more freely used as a resource. Paying four life to keep Adanto Vanguard around as an attacker after a Wrath of God is a fair price to pay; and, while that may not apply in an aggro mirror, isn't that what your sideboard is for? White 2-drops don't have a lot of competition and I've been happy with Adanto Vanguard so far, so it may have a longer Cube shelf life than many think.

Rampaging Ferocidon works on an axis of the Philosophy of Fire; and, while its ability for dealing damage is symmetrical, it usually doesn't matter that much aside from the aggro mirror, when it comes out in sideboarded games. Having three power of menace makes it a decent on-rate body and stopping lifegain is more side benefit than reason to play it and it mainly gets by as a pure damage source than a utility creature or combo breaker. But, it's fine for that too. As mentioned with Captain Lannery Storm, Red aggressive 3-drops have gotten more options and I ended up liking Captain and Crasher more, but this is still a fine option for bolstering aggro curves.

Spell Swindle is a riff on Mana Drain with longer-term potential, but I found that it just cost too much mana at five mana. It required a big spell to be cast to be worth the 5-mana cost and it was too prohibitive most of the time.

Kinjalli's Sunwing is a riff on Thalia, Heretic Cathar, with a slightly better body but worse effect. Generally, I found it to be worse than Thalia, but found it to be a nice complement to Thalia to help in midrange matches where blocking giant-sized creatures get in the way of your attacking horde. It's easy to dismiss this as a “bad Thalia” but it's better than you may think, since Kinjalli's Sunwing's flying is pretty solid. Don't discount this either.

Sorcerous Spyglass is a more proactive Pithing Needle that gets around the previous problem with Pithing Needle variants where things like Planeswalkers could be used at least once before the needle came down. Being able to look at the opponent's hand to craft future plays is also very underrated (if you aren't playing Gitaxian Probe in your Cube, you should) but I found myself less a fan of it than many others due to its 2-mana CMC being a very real extra cost. That said, it's still a solid card that stops a myriad of annoying threats while being able to get useful information.

Kitesail Freebooter is a riff on Mesmeric Fiend and overall has performed better due to its improved body.

Since the targets it can hit are fewer, it can lead to some feel-bad moments where you don't hit something, but I've found it doesn't tend to miss often — it can't do much against value creatures that would kill it like Flametongue Kavu, but it generally hits at least something good or a removal spell that would have killed it.

It's also counterintuitive thinking that having a ½ flying body is a relevant part of the evaluation equation, since there aren't many Storm Crows in Cube, but even being just a flier meant that it was able to get in for evasive damage which was useful for equipping and slowly chipping away at players and Planeswalkers. One of the liabilities I found with Mesmeric Fiend was that, while it was disruptive, being a 1/1 vanilla creature meant it usually wasn't doing anything unless the coast was clear. So, it being on a body didn't really help much. I've found that decks from Black aggro to slower variants like Dimir control enjoyed playing it, making it a nice universally playable 2-drop.

Charging Monstrosaur is essentially Reality Smasher but much easier to cast since it doesn’t require wingding mana. That’s a big boon and, as such, offers a lot of bang for your mana buck. However, as strong as it is, you may end up having a hard time including it in your Cube solely because other 5-drops perform better due to limited slots. It does survive Wildfires, though, and does a great job of efficiently killing opposing Planeswalkers, so if you want a Wildfire-resistant threat, this angle may help to push something out, but even that may be hard to do.

Siren Stormtamer is a new Flying Men variant which and a great tempo creature that typically didn't lack for targets. However, since Blue control decks weren't in the market for a 1/1 for , the decks that wanted to play it were small in number. Obviously it's great in tempo decks and of course, those tend to be limited in Cube, so for that very reason, it may be difficult to put your Cube.

Old-Growth Dryads' drawback is too high to be worth playing.

Regisaur Alpha compares to Broodmate Dragon by bringing an good amount of value for the mana cost, providing seven power for five mana, with three power having haste. It's good that it isn't like a lot of other Gruul cards that cost four mana, but found it was a bit too low impact for the mana cost and multicolored restriction. I'd certainly play it if I saw it in a Cube draft and I was in Gruul colors, but finding room for it in a Cube would be more difficult to do.

Burning Sun's Avatar unfortunately, stacks rather poorly in a slot that isn't in any rush to be filled. As cliché as it is to say, it's miles from Inferno Titan and stacks up poorly to other Red 6-drops — or even other Red 5-drops, which have been getting more and more competitive. While the damage potential that Burning Sun's Avatar gives is strong and can have a big board impact upon resolution due to the raw power of Searing Blaze (with landfall), it just didn't perform all that well.

Lastly, Thalia's Lancers ends up being an honorary include as Ixalan brings upon a change to the

Planeswalker rules, making it so that they are Legendary. When the rule change were announced, I started looking more at Thalia's Lancers as a tutor attached to a sizable body (which most tutors don't tend to be.) The CubeTutor 450-card average included 27 Planeswalkers to supplement the 36 legendary permanents; nearly doubling the count.

Take a look at a recent White deck:

Recent White Deck ? Cube| Usman Jamil

• Creatures (17)
• 1 Baneslayer Angel
• 1 Blade Splicer
• 1 Dryad Militant
• 1 Elite Vanguard
• 1 Expedition Envoy
• 1 Gisela, the Broken Blade
• 1 Hangarback Walker
• 1 Isamaru, Hound of Konda
• 1 Kitchen Finks
• 1 Mother of Runes
• 1 Porcelain Legionnaire
• 1 Restoration Angel
• 1 Savannah Lions
• 1 Soldier of the Pantheon
• 1 Soltari Trooper
• 1 Student of Warfare
• 1 Thraben Inspector

• Planeswalkers (2)
• 1 Elspeth, Knight-Errant
• 1 Elspeth, Sun's Champion

• Instants (2)
• 1 Disenchant
• 1 Unexpectedly Absent

• Sorceries (1)
• 1 Ravages of War

• Enchantments (1)
• 1 Quarantine Field

• Artifacts (1)
• 1 Sword of War and Peace

• Lands (16)
• 15 Plains
• 1 Karakas

Buy This Deck

Generally, tutors either want to have something very powerful to look for or a robust toolbox. Thalia's Lancers now getting Planeswalkers hits on both counts, as going Thalia's Lancers into Elspeth, Sun's Champion is a pretty amazing curve and adding both Elspeths makes the curve more robust, where it arguably may not have before.

The new rule also may help with having a lot of a specific Planeswalkers (Jace, Chandra, Gideon) but I found this was more of a relevant thing on an in-game scale rather than a Cube design scale.

Thanks for reading, I hope you've enjoyed this review of Ixalan for Cube!

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