Some Underrated Cards from 2024!

Like many things lately, I had this idea of “cards that flew under the radar for cube” in my mind in a rather sudden time frame, like with the podcast. I didn’t really want to do a “year in review” like I would have years ago, since it’d essentially be linking to my old content and saying “yep, those are the sets that happened and I wrote about them, here ya go” and it didn’t really seem all that necessary. (That said, I still plan on doing a post about Duskmourn and another one about my experience at CubeCon 2024.)

Instead, I wanted to focus on cards that I’ve been seeing flying under the radar in cubes. Since CubeCon, I’ve been making an effort to keep my toes dipped into multiple cube spaces since there’s always been a trend towards self-partitioning in the cube space.

I’m going to assume that my target audience is one that is familiar with how cards in the MTGO Vintage Cube is, since it’s the most visible cube online and several well-known cubes (LSV, AlphaFrog, PowerMack) are similar on a macro sale.

This is also a good time as any to note that some time this year, I was invited to and am in the group that does updates for the MTGO (Vintage) cubes. Being the first writer to discuss the MTGO Cube (at least on a major site) and being one of its most staunch critics, I’m happy to be on the inside making positive changes and an advocate for suggestions/feedback on it!

Not all of the following are still in my list, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re bad. I’ll break these down by cards that I’d been trying out and cards that I’ve been seeing and looking forward to trying (and therefore am speculating on them.) Some of the latter may never end up being tried, but they’re at least on the radar to give a whirl in my own Legacy-lite cube.

Thundertrap Trainer is a card that I’ve liked as an effect that blue decks had wanted for a while, as a consistent “Wall of Omens” (although I don’t think the namesake is even that good anymore, power-level wise.) It’s been filling the role pretty well by being a roadblock that sometimes trades with an aggro dork that usually draws a card, and drawing two late in the game. During preview/testing season, the impression that I got was that Thundertrap “drew” one as often as being “kicked”, but not that much more often, although when I’ve been seeing it in the trenches now, it’s more often “unkicked.” Not sure why.

Strix Serenade is a card that I’ve not really seen much, and it may be because cards like Swansong are just terrible outside of the most unfair contexts when the opponent getting a 2/2 doesn’t matter. I think the only other list I’ve seen it in was Aquaone’s list, but I’m kinda surprised more lists that run initiative (mine doesn’t currently) don’t run this, since it answers those creatures so cleanly. Maybe because it also makes an evasive creature to break initiative stalls? I’m not sure. But I’ve liked it since it’s so flexible, even though often it’s a Remove Soul for U.

Final-Word Phantom is me fully acknowledging that my bias of flash is swaying me, like with High Fae Trickster, but this one at least doesn’t die to a stiff wind. Body’s pretty mediocre, but it’s not bad for just letting you play the instant game, which it did when I had it in. Hardly a staple, though.

Plagon, Lord of the Beach just came out but I’m really surprised it never got more traction. Might be because it’s in that weird space where it’s only legal in Legacy and Vintage, so people aren’t able to play it in commonly played constructed formats to see its power (like with good ol’ Heirloom Blade) but what I said in my Foundations review pretty much remains.

Nuclear Fallout is another card like Plagon that hadn’t really gotten much attention, potentially because it’s not good enough for Legacy constructed, but being an Infest with kicker was good. I’m not currently running it because nothing else in my cube deals with rad counters, but I could just print a QR code that links to the rad counter thing. I’m not sure.

Sawhorn Nemesis is another one that falls into that similar space and it doesn’t have haste, so it can’t just kill someone out of nowhere like Headliner Scarlett, but it usually does with whatever else you have lying around. Red 4s are pretty interchangeable but this is one of the better ones because it’s just SO good at ending the game, and even just ending the game with burn if your creatures get outclassed and burn is your main wincon.

Veronica, Dissident Scribe was a fan favorite as she usually double-drew when attacking at the cost of discarding. Usually, it was good enough to be worth playing in most red decks unless they were curving higher. I’m currently on Squee as my current Rabblemaster du jour with no other ones but I currently like her more than the non-Squee Rabbles.

With these first three, I’m unsure if part of their being underrated was due to green being pretty middling in Standard, but - especially with Analyze the Pollen - it played similar to something like Lorien Revealed where it was able to quietly bring the room together by providing utilitarian function for green decks (get a land early, get a creature later) which wasn’t hard to do in decks that had things like the LoTR landcyclers.

Archdruid’s Charm and Sharp-Eyed Rookie have been nice role-players, usually punching above their weight. I’ve never really had decks having a hard time reaching the GGG cost for Archdruid’s Charm (or UUU for Archmage’s Charm) but I’m also at a pretty bog standard mana rate for lands for my cube (around 14.2%, compared to about 15%) so I’m not sure why.

Eladamri, Korvecdal usually plays well as a “play off the top” kind of card like the ones we’ve seen over the years and occasionally it’ll do its mana cheat thing - but it’s mainly there to get value off the top. Maybe the cheat thing is Additive Distraction, making people think that it has to be played with big mana things? Not sure.

Tarmogoyf Nest is something that I thought looked weird (and it is), but it was something that a friend took p1p1 in a draft and built around it - noting that if a deck got to the state where it was able to make a couple of Tarmogoyfs off of it, the game was over since they were big enough to generally close out the game. Because of that, the deck was a GU ramp deck that played to the late game - treating it as a 6-drop, and that may just be the way to evaluate it. I’m not currently running it but could easily see it coming back.

Horizon of Progress is another card where Additive Distraction could be part of it being underrated, since its middle mode echoes Terrain Generator - a very inefficient land. Usually, decks that have been playing it have been playing it as another type of Horizon land that emulates Reflecting Pool instead of a dual. Usually, it was good enough in those decks (and I’m always happy to see lands that bin themselves for things like Titania.)

Kellogg, Dangerous Mind isn’t a value removal spell like a lot of Rakdos’ cards, but as I noted in the Foundations review, it’s significantly better than Alesha since this usually emulates a hasty Magda, Brazen Outlaw and - at least in the early game - has a very hard time being blocked, so it almost always just acts like a 2-mana rock that bashes face. I’ve never seen its treasure mode get used but that’s not surprising. Very much a fan favorite around here.

Mabel, Heir to Cragflame suffered by being in a color combination with a lot of really strong cards, but when I was trying her out, she was a nice modal-type card as a 3-mana 3/3 creature (which is pretty mid these days, but oh well) that gave everything - herself included, a virtual 2-mana kicker that gave something +1/+1, haste and some other keywords. The whole mice lord thing doesn’t really matter, it’s better than you think.

The rest of these are cards that I’m more speculating on rather than noting from actual experience on and look ing to at least give a whirl to - even with me pretty aggressively trying things out in new sets, I’m excited to see how these end up.

Exorcise - mostly I’m looking to try this out from seeing people better than me singing its praise as a catch-all type of card. It has the whole “does a lot” thing and killing big things helps with it covering more bases, but it’s a sorcery. Excited to try it.

Toby, Beastie Befriender - initially, I thought that this was just a bad Blade Splicer but the current verdict is that this is better and that the drawback isn’t much of a thing (not that I’m going to replace Blade Splicer with it, but it may just end up doing that in the long-term.) I’m not currently running Karakas but that’s also part of what makes Toby good but not all of it.

Static Prison - I always loved GO TO JAIL but cut it when I made my cube follow Legacy legality, even though it’s totally a card that could be played in Legacy. The assumption was that you’d get at least a turn out of GO TO JAIL if you were super unlucky and the rest was gravy, and that’s what this does - and also just gets any non-land… and also, sticks around for 2 turns. Neat!

Murmuration - This one is mostly hopes that it can get there by being a ⅔ when it gets played and then just accumulates a ton of value later from casting spells. Hopefully. I’m unsure exactly how many birds are needed to make the initial cost worth it. 3?

Rottenmouth Viper was something that I saw in Aquaone’s list and I’ve always wanted something that was a good payoff for sacrificing things/some way to use small bodies, since the payoffs were usually just terrible. Cautiously optimistic that it gets there, but if not, oh well.

Star Athlete is something that caught my eye as a weird Goblin Heelcutter type thing that comes in, stops something from blocking and punching in for some amount of damage, with the backup mode of being able to just be hardcasted (although the mana costs on the “real mode” and the “haste mode” are flipped.) I’m counting it as a 4-drop and maybe it’s a terrific athlete, like Homestar Runner is, but I have my doubts. Still, I want to try it.

Assaultron Dominator and Synth Eradicator are cards that caught my eyes as creatures that are incidentally artifacts and punch above their weight class for being cheap artifact creatures. I might just be trying too hard to make Cranial Plating work. Hahahaha, who am I kidding, I am.

Brightcap Badger is a card that I saw in some lists and asked on Brainstorming what was good about it - it was mainly because of the adventure mode at EOT, then playing this mode, making it one of the better 4s. Going to give it a whirl because of that.

Dissection Tools hadn’t gotten a lot of cube attention as a worse Batterskull that could, potentially, be more “offensive” than the old living weapon since it doesn’t cost a boatload of mana. I’m not really a fan of the gameplay of Kaldra Compleat with Stoneforge Mystic’s cheat effect and cautiously optimistic that it plays a similar role/gives Stoneforge some redundancy, since the Sword cycle doesn’t seem to cut it these days. Maybe this is a better “expendable bodies” payoff than Rottenmouth Viper? Or maybe they both end up doing good things together?

Pip-Boy 3000 is another one that I saw from Aquaone’s list; he said all of the modes are usually live and sometimes it just equips for free (untapping two lands.) I’m currently looking to make Trinket Mage have a higher critical mass of effects to make it work. Hopefully this helps.

Lazotep Quarry looks like it could… maybe get there as a way to turn a dead small Mulldrifter into a giant 4/4. Around 4 MV may be where the deal of it making a 4/4 version of the exiled creature starts to wear thin, but wondering if that may end up being worth it anyway. I’d seen zero hype for it so I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s just terrible, but very very cautiously optimistic on it.

Thanks for reading! You can find more of my socials on my Linktree.