Cube Deck Building: From 45 Picks to a 40-Card Deck

After the last pick, you have a stack of 45 cards and about twenty minutes. This is where many first drafts go wrong. Not because the cards were bad, but because the deck tried to play all of them.

This lesson is the building half of the night: the rules that apply, then a method that works for almost any Cube.

The rules that apply

A Cube deck follows the same limited rules as a booster draft deck:

• At least 40 cards. There is no maximum, but more cards only makes your best ones show up less.
• Any number of basic lands. They do not come from the draft. The host provides them, and you take what you need.
• Your sideboard is everything else. Every card in your pool that is not in your deck is in your sideboard.

Official booster drafts give about 25 minutes to build and register a deck. Casual Cube nights usually allow 20 to 25 and call a two-minute warning.

Step 1: find your two colors

Sort your picks by color into piles: white, blue, black, red, green, gold, and colorless. Then look for the two colors with the most good cards, especially the most removal and the best creatures.

Two colors is the default for a reason. Your mana works, your spells come out on time, and your early drops are castable. A third color is a decision, not a habit.

Gold cards only count if they match the two colors you choose. A great gold card outside your colors goes in the sideboard, along with that first pick that never found a home. The deck is the 40 you play, not the 45 you took.

Step 2: lay out the curve

Put your two colors’ spells in rows by mana value: one row for one-drops, one for twos, and so on up. This is your mana curve.

Most good draft decks look roughly like this:

These are habits, not rules. An aggressive deck wants more cheap cards. A control deck can carry a few more expensive ones. But a deck with nothing to do on turn two loses to decks that do. Our piece on the Cube mana curve explains why two-drops matter most.

Step 3: cut to 23

Count your spells. If you have more than 23, cut from the top of the curve first, then the weakest cards. If you have fewer than 23 good ones, add the best of the rest, and favor cheap creatures and removal.

Check the mix as you cut:

• Creatures. Most decks want around 13 to 17. Fewer only if you have a plan that does not need them. Our guide to Cube creature count covers the exceptions.
• Removal. Keep every good removal spell you can cast.
• Card advantage. One or two cards that draw extra cards keep you going in long games.

Step 4: add 17 lands

Most 40-card decks play 17 lands. Play 16 only if your deck is low and fast, with almost nothing above three mana.

Split the basics by your colored symbols. Count the colored mana symbols in your spells. If two thirds of them are red, make about two thirds of your basics Mountains. Weight it a little more toward the color of your cheap spells, since those need their mana first.

If you drafted lands that make two colors, count them as lands. They replace basics; they do not add to the 17. Our guide to Cube land count shows how fixing lands shape a draft.

Should you splash a third color?

A splash means adding one or two cards from a third color, with a few sources of that color’s mana. It works when:

• The splash card is much better than what it replaces, usually removal or a bomb.
• It costs only one symbol of the splash color.
• You drafted fixing: dual lands or mana artifacts that make that color.

It goes wrong when you splash on basics alone and keep drawing the wrong land. For a first draft, skip the splash. For a later draft, splash for one great card, not four good ones.

Sideboarding between games

Between games of a match, you can swap cards between your deck and sideboard. Use it. A deck facing many fliers can bring in a card that stops them. A deck facing removal-heavy control can swap a slow card for a cheap threat.

Before your next match, many casual groups let you rebuild freely. Ask your host, and see our guide to Cube sideboard rules for the house rules groups add.

A quick check before you shuffle

1. Exactly 40 cards?
2. Two colors, or two plus a careful splash?
3. At least eight cards that cost two or less?
4. Seventeen lands, split by your colored symbols?
5. Every playable removal spell in the deck?

If you can say yes five times, you have a deck. Our Cube draft strategy guide covers how to draft toward this deck from the first pick.