Lucky Paper Radio Andy Mangold and Anthony Mattox

Andy and Anthony are joined by Sam from Rhystic Studies to talk about his first Cube design project. Sam, who produces thoughtful, carefully written videos on Magic, has been interested in Cube design for years and has finally made the leap to create his own list. They talk about what motivates Sam’s design goals, how he’s approached the project, and what he’s looking forward to in his first experiences playing it.

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Timestamps

0:00 - Introduction

3:06 - Betrayal Corner and the Magic to Game Design Pipeline

7:53 - Introduction to “Kitchen Table All Stars”, Sam’s new Cube

11:46 - Why now and why Cube is Sam’s “end game” for Magic

22:22 - Cube Design in the Liminal Space Between the First Complete List and the First Actual Draft

30:23 - What Are Sam’s Goals for the First Draft

44:34 - What are the other hallmark cards of Kitchen Table All Stars?

51:38 - Identifying and Handling Power Outliers

56:13 - Pack 1, Pick 1 from Sam’s Cube

Discussed in this episode:


Intro backing music “Lonesome Journey” by KeysOfMoonMusic
Betrayal (Board Game)
Pandemic (Board Game)
Sam’s Cube, “Kitchen Table All Stars”
Episode 191: Vibes-Forward Cube Design with Ryan Overturf
Steve Stillman on Twitter
Episode 182: Emergent Cube Design by Example
100 Ornithopters in a Trenchcoat
Caleb Gannon’s Drafts of His Own Powered Synergy Cube on MTGO
Sam’s Interview on Humans of Magic
Hillary’s “Baby’s First Cube”
DanDan
Dear Gonti, Love Sophie by Rhystic Studies
Understanding Sagas | How Magic Art Depicts In-World Histories by Rhystic Studies
Red Deck Wins by Rhystic Studies
Games Within Games | The Story of “Forgetful Fish” by Rhystic Studies

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Our Cube Prospective Surveys for Outlaws of Thunder Junction is now open! Let us know what you are testing in your cube from the latest set.

Andy and Anthony talk about their first impressions of Outlaws of Thunder Junction and the cards their interested in for their own Cube lists. Anthony is not too impressed by the aesthetics of the set, but they manage to power through, talk about the mechanics and how they might be relevant to different Cube designers, and even a few individual cards that stand out.

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Discussed in this episode:


Kristen Schaal is a Horse!
Washington Cube Champs
Cali Cube Champs

Get tickets
Join the Discord

Uber Cube Event
Boston Cube Party
Cube Dungeon Con
MagicCon Panel About Representation of Native Peoples, Thanks Brodie!
The Holodeck
Episode 129 on the State of the Game and Design for an “Eternal World”
Good Morning Magic “The Problem with Kicker and How We Fixed It”
Andy’s Monocolored Starter Decks
An Ode to Scalable Threats, by Andy
Emma Partlow’s tweet about the OTJ set symbols

Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction

3:26 - Upcoming Cube Event Rundown

9:17 - Andy and Anthony’s Broad Impressions of Outlaws of Thunder Junction

25:27 - Mechanics from Outlaws of Thunder Junction

26:10 - Outlaws

28:19 - Committing a Crime

36:01 - Spree

44:29 - Mounts and Saddle

48:08 - Plot

51:12 - Unnamed mechanics and themes

52:14 - Bun Magic Cube Additions

52:55 - Slick Shot Showoff

53:48 - Goldvein Hydra

54:50 - Harvester of Misery

56:22 - Andy’s long list of half-considered ‘maybes’ for the Bun Magic Cube

57:04 - Regular Cube Additions

57:41 - Trained Arynx

58:32 - Demonic Ruckus

59:15 - Bristly Bill, Spine Sower

1:00:17 - 100 Ornithopters Additions

1:02:24 - Lost Jitte

1:04:43 - Trash the Town

1:09:10 - Pitiless Carnage

1:10:14 - Pest Control

1:11:03 - Requisition Raid

1:13:07 - Turbo Cube Additions

1:13:28 - Magebane Lizard

1:14:17 - Geralf, the Fleshwright

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Guests Tara, Jenn, and Haiyue join Andy and Anthony for a discussion on making play spaces that are more accountable and inclusive to help grow more diverse playgroups. Tara brings her perspective as a professional diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant; Jenn, their experience organizing and judging events; and Haiyue what she’s learned managing the VML, and, from all of them, much much more.

As Cube designers, our hosts and many of our listeners need to grow their communities as much as their Cube lists if they hope to play consistently. Our guests bring their broader perspective on why it’s so important to do that in an inclusive way and how to go about it.

Discussed in this episode:


Episode 130: Cube Community Building
5 Steps to Break Down Gender Barriers in MTG by guest Haiyue
How To Organize Inclusive And Accessible Events by guest Tara with help from other contributors
The View From Here by Katie G. Bates
Playing with Power — Inclusivity in Magic
Safe and Brave Spaces Don’t Work (and What You Can Do Instead) by Elise Ahenkorah
The VML
CubeCon
Redlining in the United States
Magic the Gathering Infraction Procedure Guide
Set Boundaries Find Peace Book by Nedra Tawwab
No Land Beyond
Tara’s Website

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Andy and Anthony talk about Andy’s newest Cube experiment: a cube who’s only creatures are Ornithopters. Andy couldn’t help but entertain the idea of an all-ornithopter Cube in a humorous tweet, and a recent draft of it in the Cube Con discord inspired him to flesh out the idea even further.

Our first playmat is currently available for pre-order! Illustrated by Andy and featuring gold, foiled details it expresses our love of the most punk rock Magic format.


Pre-order a playmat here

The show now has a dedicated PO box. Want to send us a letter? A drawing? I don’t know, maybe an Ornithopter you doodled on you want Andy to put in his Cube? Send it along to:

Lucky Paper

PO Box 4855

Baltimore, MD 21211

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Discussed in this episode:


McMurdo Station Antartica
Our Previous Episode Discussing Art
Star Trek: The Next Generation
MtG Cube Talk Discord Server
Carly Mazur’s About Page
Can it be all Ornithopters?
CubeCon Discord Server
ChillMTG on YouTube

Cubes Mentioned:


100 Ornithopters

Timestamps

0:00 - Introduction

1:39 - Opening up the Plug Bag

6:24 - Art Episode Follow Up

20:02 - 100 Ornithopters Cube Introduction

25:50 - Anthony’s First Impressions of 100 Ornithopters

32:25 - The powerful strategies this cube supports

41:33 - Known issues with the 100 Ornithopters Cube

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Our first, limited edition playmat is now available for pre-order. The playmat is designed and illustrated by Andy and custom printed to order. Orders will only be available for a limited time. Pre-order a mat here.

Andy and Anthony talk about “ART!” loosely as it relates to Magic: The Gathering. They talk about the role of creative work in the game, the nuances of art and illustration, how the approach to illustration has changed over the history of the game, and even the present and future of large language model generated images.

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Discussed in this episode:


ART THOUGHTZ: How to Make an Art.
“The Game”
Garden Path Sentences
Google’s new artificial intelligence can’t understand these sentences. Can you?
Rhystic Studies: “my next video is about that painting you hate”
Klimt
Mannerist Painting
Algomancy
Midjourney
Tweening
The Arts and Crafts Movement
Carly Mazur’s Portfolio
Marina Abramovich
Cube Map Print
The Room Movie Poster
Impressionism
Episode 42: Cube, Art School, & Critical Discourse
Tromploi
Claude Monet
Édouard Manet
Jackson Pollock
Piet Mondrian
Adobe Photoshop Generative Fill
Minecraft
Robert Hodgin: Meander
WotC statement saying they won’t use AI
Sturgeon’s Law
Apophysis
Make my hot dog hotter
Edward Muybridge: The Horse in Motion
The Slo Mo Guys on Youtube
Trashfuture: Big Tesco Back Tattoo ft. Tom O’Mahony
Well There’s Your Problem: The Death of Hyperloop

Timestamps

0:00 - Introduction and Garden Path Sentence Corner

5:24 - Overview of episode

7:57 - Why is there art in Magic?

10:22 - Are the illustrations in Magic even “Art”?

28:56 - What do we think about Carly Mazur’s Faithless Looting?

34:44 - The Invention of the Camera and the Beginning of Modern Art

46:34 - On AI Generated Art

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Andy and Anthony are joined by Ryan Overturf, sharing his Cube design wisdom. Starting with Ryan’s articles on power outliers and letting fun drive Cube design, they talk about their approach to Cube design and how they let play experience, vibes, and taste inform their processes.

⁠View all cards mentioned in the episode →⁠

Discussed in this episode:


Ryan on Star City Games
Power Level Outliers And How To Handle Them In Magic Cubes
Magic Cube Design: Make The Fun Thing The Good Thing
Andrew Elenbogen’s Tweet on Magic Data
Pony by Orville Peck
Cascade Cube
The Turbo Cube
The r/spikes spoiler thread for Treasure Cruise
@RyanOverdrive on Twitter

Timestamps

0:00 - Introduction

3:51 - What is a power level outlier?

18:40 - Exciting cards to draft and the right vs. the wrong power outliers

28:54 - How power level outliers might make the game more egalitarian

33:05 - Making mopey threats appealing with the power of nostalgia

35:46 - Power level outlier’s contributions to a player’s ability to  make a comeback

Check us out on Twitch and YouTube for paper Cube gameplay.

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:


Andy’s “Bun Magic” Cube
Anthony’s “Regular” Cube

If want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube submit it on our website. Send in questions to the show at mail@luckypaper.co. You can also find both your hosts in the MTG Cube Talk Discord.

If you’d like to show your support for the show, please leave us a review on iTunes or wherever you listen.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.