On this website Hanjo writes a love letter for a Magic the Gathering card every day. Danny writes hate letters for a Magic the Gathering card every now and again. You can read about our feelings here.
When you were released in 2004 you took vintage by storm. You were the best Tinker target ever printed, by far. Before you came along, Phyrexian Colossus was the top dog. And it was so bad, people sometimes just choose to be ok with Karn, Silver Golem, Memory Jar or Triskelion. But then you were there, the shining star in the sky Tinker players have been praying for all those years.
Over 20 years later time has caught up with you. In vintage, in cube, everywhere. You are nothing more than a relic of the past. I remember those days, in standard, when people would beat my face in with you after they found you with Tooth and Nail. The best versions of you were the tokens Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker would make. I miss those days.
That is what I love about my ‘Year<2010 Power Cube’. It’s my museum for those old days, for those memories. Because it offers all the sweet stuff: Tinker, Tooth and Nail and Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker. And you are the best target for all 3. I love that. I love that cube can offer you that Darksteel Colossus, because you deserve it.
At first glance you look like a light version of Mother of Runes. An in between from her and Benevolent Bodyguard. Only one time protection, but also a small buff and you stick around for the potential to be recycled. Not as oppressive and powerful as Mother of Runes can be. Not as bad as Benevolent Bodyguard. But you are so much more than that. In the right context you are so much more fun.
In my Gimmicky Cube I wanted to include a proliferate theme. In my experience you always get an abundance of +1/+1 counters in a Cube with a proliferate theme. I didn’t want that for this cube. I’ve got the following tasty flavours on offer in my Gimmicky Cube:
-1/-1 counters
Oil counters
Arrow counters
Javelineer counters
Level counters
Stun counters
Charge counters
Shield counters
Valor counters
Quest counters
Verse couners
Time counters
Quite a big collection of different counters, right?
But I couldn’t resist, I just couldn’t resist you. You are the perfect turn one play to accompany a turn 2 Thrumming Bird or Grateful Apparition. Not only do you protect them, they buff you and after that they start buffing themselves and other creatures. Together you guys get out of hand, and get out of hand quick. Because of you, I just had to also include +1/+1 counters. But because it’s you, in this context, that’s ok.
Yesterday I was doing a houseman draft of my Gimmicky Cube together with my brother. My Gimmicky Cube tries to seduce the drafters to explore the gimmicky side of magic while creating a lot of interesting and complex gameplay. I drafted a sweet blue and white proliferate deck. My brother drafted a very strong black and red discard deck.
During game 1 my brother had multiple moments taking his time figuring out his lines. I loved seeing this, I love it when a cube offers the type of gameplay where the correct play isn’t obvious. Where there are so many possibilities that every turn is a puzzle to solve.
In game 3, on turn 4, my brother played a Skinrender. I recovered well and created quite a powerful boardstate on turn 4. My brother tanked on turn 5. He had a puzzle to solve. He decided on playing you Jaxis. He didn’t just cast you, he Blitzt you. Then activated you, discarding an Avacyn’s Judgment. He copied his Skinender, killing 2 of my creatures and drawing 2 cards in the process. A four for two. It absolutely destroyed me. But I didn’t lose. That is the beauty of being a cube designer. Even when you lose your match to such an amazing sequence of plays, the smile on your opponent’s face for solving that puzzle lets you win every time again and again.
You are in one of my cubes, my 2009 power cube. A cube capturing the days when I started playing cube, with 10 Fetches and Goblin Guide but without Jace, the Mind Sculptor. You are great in that cube, but it is not my favourite cube to play with you. That is in my dear friend Frank his Artifact Cube, because in that cube I get to combine you with Grand Architect.
I learned to play Magic from my brother. We used to play FNM together in 2003, but where he found other interests I kept playing Magic. In 2011 he joined me on a trip to memory lane and we played a FNM together with me at our old local game store. I played Sun Titan decks in Standard that season, I gave him this sweet Grand Architect brew because it played you, Mindslaver. He used to play Tooth and Nail back in 2003 together with you and always loved you. In the finals of that FNM we met, both undefeated at 3-0, and I don’t think I ever saw him enjoy magic more than on that night. In the deciding game 3, he used a Tumble Magnet to tap down my Sun Titan, had a Phantasmal Image to copy my Sun Titan, returning a Buried Ruin to recur you, Mindslaver, and with the help of Grand Architect he could play you. Such an insane loop, such a cool line but most of all such an amazing memory.
So every time we draft Frank his Artifact Cube it is a trip down memory lane for me, seeing you together with your architect. And I love those memories of you.
I hope this letter finds you in a graveyard. There are cards that destroy you. There are cards that counter a spell. There are cards that create more magic cards and more interaction. And there is you.
You’re actually not even a magic card, you are a hostage situation that keeps on repeating. It’s groundhog day, but worse. For the younger kids out there, this was the most infuriating thing that could happen to you. End of turn, Capsize with buyback target your land. My turn? Nobody has ever resolved you, Capsize with buyback, and made people happy. Well, maybe the person casting you. Because this is probably how the game will look like every turn after this one.
Buyback is one of those mechanics that sounds cute until you realize it was designed by someone who looked at a bounce spell and thought:
“What if this never ended?”
“What if every permanent became a temporary suggestion?”
“What if board presence was just a rumor?”
“What if fun had summoning sickness and then got bounced before combat?”
“Is this real life? Or is this fantasy? Freddy, come in here!”
That’s you, Capsize. Repeat until the opponent starts chatgpt-ing ‘how to get away with murder’.
The smug part, that’s the real kicker. You’re not excited, but you just keep coming back, and back, and back. The smug face is getting bigger and bigger and bigger. Here’s a threat, not today my friend, Capsize with buyback to the rescue. It’s also that you don’t end games, you just show hatred extensively. Are we still playing? You feel like a hamster? Really? Tell me more.
I never conceded soon enough. And when I did it was not because I lost, it’s because I wanted to get out. This was my cry for help. My creatures were stuck in a merry-go-round where they showed up, ready to disappear again.
At some point you realize, we are not even playing anymore. We are just doing a routine, it’s not drama anymore. You don’t do drama, you like repetition. Capsize, you are the magic card that explains our Dutch happy hardcore music the most. For our Dutch readers, you are the ‘Hardcore will never dieeees’ guy screaming on top of his lungs at 04:00 AM putting his nike air max to the endurance test.
Yesterday when Danny, my co-writer here on this website, read my love letter for Bonecaller Cleric, he responded: “A random cleric that just happens to fit exactly in cube 342, classic Hanjo.”
I get most excited about commons and uncommons that slide perfectly into one of my Master Cubes. When you find a card that fit multiple archetypes, create certain sequences, that have that synergy I’ve been looking for. I’ve read you, Woodland Acolyte, during spoiler season. I really like the Adventure mechanic, I think it is one of the best ever made, and when I read you I just knew you would slide into one of my cubes.
I used to play Gifts Ungiven in standard and Reclaim was in that deck. Reclaim is not a very good Magic card, but it fit perfectly with Gifts Ungiven. Your adventure, Mend the Wilds, is the little brother of Reclaim. In the right deck, just your adventure could be worth it. But you, Woodland Acolyte, is just a fine enough card in a lower power level environment. Especially if you can be synergistic with you enters ability.
The last 2 days I wrote love letters for cards that I found when I jumped into the rabbit hole of updating my Mich Masters Cube. A cube that is an ode to all the brews my friend Micha-el used to make. Gifts Ungiven wasn’t a card Micha-el used to play, but it fitted the time frame and vibe of the cube so it has been an inclusion since day 1. The thing is, to make Gifts Ungiven work, you either have to play Unburial Rites (which I don’t like), Life From the Loam (which is hard in draft) or recursion effects. You could be a perfect one off search target for Gifts Ungiven in that cube. Especially in a Bant Astral Slide deck, because abusing your enters ability after a Gifts Ungiven, sounds like music to my ears.
But the best thing about you, the reason my heart jumped when I saw you in that Scryfall search in my rabbit hole, is something I missed when reading you in spoiler season. I was doing a Scryfall search for the creature type ‘Cleric’. I love these moments when you find a card that just brings so much together in a cube.
Two days ago I jumped into a Rabbit Hole of updating my cube that is an ode to all the great brews my friend Micha-el used to make: Mich Masters. Back in Extended Micha-el used to play a Cleric tribal deck. His favourite line was turn 1 Dark Supplicant, into turn 2 Withered Wretch, into turn 3 Rotlung Reanimator. Then he would sacrifice his 3 Clerics, getting Scion of Darkness and take over the game from there. This playpattern is also captured in Mich Masters.
In this cube this was always a difficult play pattern to be fair. Because rares only have one copy in the cube, getting the Scion of Darkness wasn’t a given, that was until the 8th of July of 2022. With the release of Double Masters 2022 Scion of Darkness got an uncommon reprint. But since I hadn’t updated this cube since that time, I never moved Scion of Darkness to an uncommon slot in that cube. Until now that is.
Having access to 2 Scion of Darkness makes this Dark Supplicant line so much more potent. And during one of the many Scryfall searches I did in my time in the Rabbit Hole I found me a hidden gem. That gem is you, Bonecaller Cleric. Because you are a Cleric, and you create another amazing line with Scion of Darkness. Playing you on turn 2, Cycling Scion of Darkness on turn 3 and then activating your ability on turn 4 is a perfect sequence. Now all that is left is to have Micha-el to discover this play pattern during a draft. Because that smile on his face during these types of perfect sequences is what made me build this cube in the first place.
Yesterday I sat down to shuffle my cube Mich Masters in preparation for the invitational I’m organising next week. Mich Masters is the cube I’ve built as an ode to all the cool brews my friend Micha-el used to make. I haven’t played the cube in a while, and didn’t change anything in a while. I always enjoyed playing this cube a lot. The first invitational I won, we played this cube in the top 4 draft. I remember beating my dear friend Wander his mono red aggro deck to a pulp with a crazy strong Cleric deck. So many good memories came floating back when looking through the cube.
Something else also happened when I was looking through the cube. I wanted to change stuff. I didn’t change anything in a long time, and since we live in a world where cards get released every second (at least, it feels like that), there were bound to be some new goodies for this cube. A couple of hours and a couple of Scryfall searches later, I’ve changed over 10% of the cube. I went into total hyperfocus and couldn’t stop until that itch was gone (god I love cube design). The funny thing is, it wasn’t just new goodies. For some reason I have been sleeping on the fact that you, Unearth, are AMAZING for this cube.
There is cycling in this cube. There is a Red and Black sacrifice deck. There is a White and Black Cleric deck with a lot of sacrifice. You slot so perfect into all of that. You are a perfect fit and I am so surprised that I didn’t release that in the past 10 years. But I’m glad I did, even if it was a little bit late. Can’t wait to see more of you in that cube.
I love you, For me you are the pinnacle of what a Magic the Gathering card should be. You are one of the most elegant designed cards ever. Your only flaw is that you can’t play you on an empty board, but that is just something every new player does that one time and then learns to never do it again. Other than that you do what you do. And you do it so well.
You have won worlds in 2001 together with Tom van de Logt. You have been a Vintage Cube staple since the beginning. The 2007 invitational was the first big showing of cube, and of course you were part of that Vintage Cube. You were part of the first MTGO Vintage Cube list. You left the MTGO Vintage Cube briefly on the 21st of July 2021 only to return the 15th of December 2023. On the 27th of June 2024 my heart was broken. You left the MTGO Vintage Cube again and this time I knew it was going to be forever. Because you have been surpassed. Because a couple of weeks earlier Pyrogoyf was released. And Pyrogoyf is just a better you. It took 23 years, but time had finally caught up with you. And it made me so sad.
But then I realised I don’t have to be sad. Pyrogoyf is a rare, and at uncommon you have not been surpassed. And I like Peasant Cube way better than I like Vintage Cube anyways. Now I just have to hope Pyrogoyf isn’t reprinted at uncommon in the future. You never know with Wizards these days. Or maybe by that time I am old enough to be a stubborn old man. Lets hope so.
I remember when you were printed. I thought that Wizards broke Magic. A one mana 2/2 without a real downside made no sense to me whatsoever. Your results agree: 7 constructed Pro Tour top 8’s prove that. You have changed the way we view white weenies, you became THE white weenie.
Oh times have changed. Last year Wolf Cove Villager was printed at common. The card doesn’t see any play and never will. A vanilla one drop doesn’t cut it any more. With the complexity creep these days one drops must have a whole lot of abilities slapped on to them, just look at Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer. I miss those times where you, Isamaru, would growl fear into your opponents hearts.
Jackal Pup was your predecessor. Because of how good Jackel Pup was at his prime, we couldn’t believe you when you were printed. Jackel Pup still has a place in Magic, because of Pre-Modern. But you are just a tad too new for that popular format and just not powerful enough in other formats to still have a place in Magic.
But I still get to enjoy you. Because I build cubes. And in a Cube I get to decide what the one drop of choice is. I get to decide who gets to growl fear into opponents hearts. I get to decide which weenie is THE white weenie. And I, I chose you.
