A cube ban list sounds redundant. A cube is already a list; anything not in it is already banned. And yet most well-run cubes carry a short written set of exclusions, because the list of what is in changes every month and the reasons for what stays out should not. The useful question is not “should I have a ban list” but “which exclusions are rules and which are just this season’s cuts.”
This article separates the two, names the cards and card types that most often end up as written rules, and shows how to word the rule so drafters understand it as a design choice rather than a grudge.
Why would a cube need a written exclusion rule at all?
Three reasons, and if none applies to your cube, you do not need one.
- The rule is a category, not a card. “No Power Nine” is a rule. “No Black Lotus” is a cut. Categories survive new printings. When Wizards prints a new zero-mana artifact that taps for mana, a category rule answers the question before anyone asks.
- Drafters keep asking. If a visiting player asks why Sol Ring is not in the cube three weeks running, the answer belongs in the primer, not in your memory.
- You share the cube. A community cube where members propose adds needs a written boundary, or every proposal cycle relitigates the same five cards. See the community cube for how that process goes wrong without one.
What a ban list should not be is a record of cards you tested and disliked. Those are cuts, they go in the changelog, and they can come back.
What goes on a cube’s exclusion list?
Most written exclusion rules fall into six categories. Each one is a line you can draw at a card, and each has a reason a drafter can read in one sentence.
Power-level categories. “No Power Nine.” “No zero-mana mana rocks” (which excludes the Moxen, Mana Crypt, Lotus Petal, Chrome Mox, Mox Diamond, Jeweled Lotus in one line). “No one-mana rocks that tap for two” is Sol Ring in a sentence that also covers any future reprint of the effect. The full argument is in cards too strong for an unpowered cube.
Mechanics that do not work at a table. Conspiracy draft-matters cards (Cogwork Librarian is the exception many cubes keep). Cards with dexterity or outside-the-game effects: Chaos Orb, Falling Star, the Wish cycle (Burning Wish, Cunning Wish, Living Wish, each of which fetches a card from outside the game, which cube has no rule for). Ante cards. Cards that reference a sideboard in a format where the sideboard is the whole draft pool.
Mechanics that do not work in singleton. Cards that only work with several copies of themselves (Squadron Hawk searches for its copies; Relentless Rats needs a stack of them) or that search for a specific named card the cube does not contain.
Lock pieces and prison. Many cubes write a rule against cards whose main effect is stopping the opponent from playing: Winter Orb, Stasis, Armageddon, Blood Moon, Trinisphere, Smokestack. These are not too strong in the abstract. They are excluded because a game where one player cannot untap is a game one of two people is enjoying. This is the category where the rule is about feel, and it is the one most worth writing down so drafters know it is deliberate.
Game-length cards. Extra-turn chains (Time Walk is Power, but Time Warp, Temporal Mastery, Nexus of Fate and Capture of Jingzhou are not). Infinite combos that take ten minutes to demonstrate. Some cubes ban Nexus of Fate specifically because it shuffles back into the library and extends the game past the night’s end.
Content. Cards an owner does not want on the table for reasons unrelated to power: specific Universes Beyond crossovers, depictions a group finds uncomfortable, cards from a set the owner has chosen not to support. This is the owner’s call and it does not need a rules justification.
What should stay off the exclusion list?
Anything you might want to test again. Oko, Thief of Crowns is the usual example. It is strong enough that many unpowered cubes leave it out, and it is also the kind of card that comes back when the format shifts. Wizards banned it in Legacy, an eternal Constructed format, in February 2021; the MTGO Vintage Cube has kept it in the list for years. A card that can move between cubes of adjacent power levels is a cut, not a ban.
The same goes for single planeswalkers, single draw engines and single combo pieces. If the reason is “this card is too strong for this cube right now,” it goes in the changelog with a date. If the reason is “cards that do this will always be too strong for what this cube is for,” it goes on the list.
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How do the reference cubes handle this?
The MTGO Vintage Cube has no ban list in the usual sense; everything is eligible, and its update posts explain each cut on the merits. What it does have is an evolving set of stated design directions that function like soft rules. The August 2025 update said the designers were “moving away from creature-cheat and ramp in this iteration.” The October 2026 update said they cut Robber of the Rich because they did not want to add more efficient creatures when such cards were already dominant. Those are exclusion rules by another name, and they are written in prose rather than as a list.
The Pauper Cube does the opposite: its whole identity is one eligibility rule, “any card with a common printing,” with a few clarifications about Magic Online-only commons and digital-only cards. The rule is the design.
Both are worth copying. A cube’s exclusion list should be short enough to fit in a primer paragraph and principled enough that a drafter could apply it to a card they have never seen.
How should the rule be worded?
Bad: “Banned: Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Grim Monolith, Library of Alexandria, Strip Mine, Winter Orb, Armageddon, Oko.”
That is a list of grudges. It does not tell a drafter what the next banned card will be, and Oko sitting next to Armageddon suggests they were excluded for the same reason when they were not.
Better, as three sentences in the primer:
This is an unpowered cube. It does not run the Power Nine or any artifact that produces more mana than it costs on the turn it enters, and it does not run land destruction or lock pieces whose main job is stopping the opponent from playing. Individual strong cards (Oko, The One Ring) come in and out; see the changelog.
Three categories, one sentence each, and a pointer to where the seasonal cuts live. A drafter can apply those sentences to Jeweled Lotus, to a new Blood Moon variant, or to next year’s broken three-drop without asking.
| Kind of exclusion | Lives in | Can come back? | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| Category rule | Primer | Only if the cube’s purpose changes | “No zero-mana mana rocks” |
| Feel rule | Primer | Rarely | “No lock pieces” |
| Format rule | Primer | No | “No Conspiracy draft-matters cards” |
| Seasonal cut | Changelog, with a date | Yes | Oko, Fury, Necropotence |
FAQ
Does a cube need a ban list?
Most do not need a card-by-card list. Most benefit from two or three written category rules in the primer that explain what is excluded and why.
What cards are commonly banned from cubes?
The Power Nine, zero-mana mana rocks, Sol Ring, Library of Alexandria, Strip Mine, lock pieces like Winter Orb and Stasis, Armageddon, and Conspiracy draft-matters cards are the most common written exclusions in unpowered cubes.
Should I ban Oko from my cube?
Treat it as a cut, not a ban. Leave it out if it dominates, write the date in the changelog, and test it again when the cube’s power level moves.
Where should the exclusion rules go?
In the primer, in prose, next to the power level statement. A rule a drafter cannot find is not a rule.
Write yours in three sentences
If you cannot state your cube’s exclusions in three sentences, the list is doing the work the design should do. Keep the rules short and argue about the cuts instead. Subscribe to The Ludarium newsletter for new cube pieces, and to hear when Cube Commonwealth, our Indianapolis cube group, sets its first night as part of The Ludarium. The game is the reason. The people are the point.
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