Games

Lucky Paper Radio

Lucky Paper Radio is a podcast about Magic: the Gathering hosted by lifelong friends Andy Mangold and Anthony Mattox. Focused primarily on sandbox formats like Cube, which are free of banlists, rotation, and net decking, the show is about the best parts of Magic and how to get the most out of the game.

Latest Episodes:

Complexity in Cube Design Oct 12, 2020

Show notes

On this week’s episode, Andy and Anthony discuss the new, extensive description and draft guide Anthony wrote about his “Regular” Cube and then consider Mark Rosewater’s definitions for the three types of complexity in Magic and how they might be applied to cube design. They talk about what Cube designers might learn from constructed formats, Anthony’s goal of making his cube resemble retail limited, exactly how many copies of Seven Dwarves you can run in a deck, whether all retail limited is actually just flavors of midrange, all about combat tricks, ASFAN (Anthony’s favorite R&D lingo), the possibilities of complex seeding in packs drafted digitally, why Tic Tac Toe absolutely sucks ass, why Andy loves fetchlands, how sometimes it’s super fun to resolve a very complicated stack or board and how sometimes it’s super not fun, whether etb-tapped lands are cool or not, a gender-neutral term for “manlands”, a new hypothetical, NSFW secret lair that Andy and Anthony would totally buy, how each color identity would design a bar, and how to make people come back for more even when they lose badly while playing your cube.

The listener submitted pack 1, pick 1 is from Varylen’s unpowered Cube. Thanks, Varylen!

Discussed in this episode:

The Grand Experiment

You can find the hosts’ primary Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Playtesting & Theorycrafting Oct 05, 2020

Show notes

Andy and Anthony are tackling a big subject in this episode: how do you turn experience playing your cube into informed design decisions that improve your environment? What do you do when your players insist that cards you included are either too good or not good enough and need to be cut? How do you handle people that are unwilling to draft or maindeck certain cards that you think are good?

The listener submitted pack 1, pick 1 this week is actually a pack 1, pick 2, because the boys are discussing Only on Tuesday’s Two-Headed Giant Cube. You can read more about the cube, and creator Jacob’s other writing about Magic, on his blog.

Topics addressed in this episode include:

Two-Headed Giant
Jett’s article on Analyzing Your Own Cube Drafts
Why you should care about the experience from a playtesting session rather than the results
Putting yourself in your drafters’ shoes
Using hypotheses to build explanatory knowledge about your cube
The ideal kinds of feedback to get from your players, and give to other cube designers
How to strike a balance between playtesting and theorycrafting, and the respective value of each

You can find the hosts’ primary Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Zendikar Rising Cube Set Review Sep 28, 2020

Show notes

On this special episode of Lucky Paper Radio, Andy and Anthony are joined by Lucky Paper founding contributor Jett Crowdis to preview the results of our Zendikar Rising cube survey and talk about our evolving impressions of the set. After doing a pack 1, pick 1 from listener Jonathan Gibson’s beautifully altered Sol Cube they go on to discuss the most popular and highest ranked cards by our listeners, how the modal double-face cards, both mythic and otherwise, stack up, how ZNR compares to other sets from the past 12 months, Banisher Priest style cards and their impact on an evironment, and whether Jett should join the cool kids club and also cut Oko.

You can find the hosts’ primary Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Turbo Eggs Sep 21, 2020

Show notes

This is your last chance to submit a response for the Zenikar Rising Cube Survey. Please take a few minutes to let us know what you’re testing in your cube from the new set so your voice can be part of our upcoming prospective article.

Andy and Anthony are dedicating an entire episode to discussing a brand new cube Anthony designed around a little tweak to Magic’s core rules. They kick things off with a pack 1, pick 1 from this very special cube and then review the results of their playtesting together. Topics of discussion include why Guild Globe is incredibly broken, how you can draw 17 cards on the first turn of the game, one cool trick to playing Black Lotus on a budget, Anthony delighting in Andy’s more miserable games, Andy and Anthony showering together with a very wet Archfiend of Ifnir, how difficult it is to design a cube that dramatically deviates from more well-worn cube design territory, the limits of tempo advantage, and the value of experimental environments.

You can find the hosts’ primary Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Power Creep, Sacred Cows, and Boiled Frogs Sep 14, 2020

Show notes

Our Zenikar Rising Cube Survey is open! Please take a few minutes to let us know what you’re testing in your cube from the new set, or if you’re not keeping your paper cube up-to-date through isolation, what you would be testing, under better circumstances.

On this episode, Andy and Anthony are talking about power creep as it applies to cube design. They do a pack 1, pick 1 from Swervestar’s The First 10 Years of Magic Cube, of which the owner graciously blessed us with a photograph of a real, physical pack. They discuss how the normal pattern of adding new cards to your cube and cutting the worst ones may lead to an unintentional power increase in an environment over time, how difficult it is to be critical of all the cards in your cube it slowly shifts and changes, how Cube captures all of the best aspects of the early years of limited Magic, how the dedicated Commander products changed Commander as a format, what Magic has in common Mario Kart, whether “fun creep” exists, and Arena “Turbo Draft”.

Discussed in this episode:

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Lay of the Lands Sep 07, 2020

Show notes

This episode is a deep dive on evaluating the new modal double-face card mechanic from Zendikar Rising by comparing it to a variety of existing mechanics from Magic’s past. Andy and Anthony kick things off by weighing in on what Feed the Swarm means for the color pie, then do a pack 1, pick 1 from listener Nomad’s Budget Cube. Then, they discuss signets, breaking cycles in your cube, the joy of running big, splashy spells at minimal cost, why Andy is going to test Lonely Sandbar, building decks that literally can’t get flooded or mana screwed, what a card has to do to “earn” its slot in a cube, why Tangled Florahedron is a case study in how much worse 2 cmc mana dorks are than 1 cmc mana dorks, Anthony’s kitchen drawer full of dildos, and bringing a little novelty into your life.

Discussed in this episode:

No Land Beyond

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Zendikar Rising First Look Sep 02, 2020

Show notes

On this very special episode of Lucky Paper Radio, Andy and Anthony give you their first impressions of Zendikar Rising based on the September 1st announcement stream. They discuss:

Double-faced lands
The new “Party” mechanic
The return of Landfall and Kicker
Set boosters, and “The List”
Upcoming future sets
The Yargle Secret Lair
Jace Shoes (???)

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Analysis Paralysis Aug 31, 2020

Show notes

This is an episode about how difficult it is to design a cube. First, Andy and Anthony do a pack 1, pick 1 from Anthony’s “Regular” Cube, which leads into a conversation about their most recent draft of the environment and the kind of feedback Anthony has received about it. They talk about how designing cubes at lower power levels is more difficult for a variety of reasons, not least of which is that players have a bias towards more powerful spells.

Then, they’re joined by John Terrill of the Cultic Cube YouTube channel and Chateau Cube podcast for a special guest segment. John, along with Cube Cobra founder Gwen Dekker, had the privilege of putting his own cube on MTGO for tens of thousands of players to draft. Wizards of the Coast have provided John and Gwen with some data pertaining to how their cubes were drafted and played, and we go deep on what can, and can’t, be gleaned from these statistics.

Discussed in this episode:

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Rotisserie Rundown Aug 24, 2020

Show notes

On this episode, Andy and Anthony bring you the long awaited conclusion of their rotisserie draft of Andy’s cube. They also do a pack 1, pick 1 from, and discuss Anthony’s draft of, Riku’s Jund Cube, which leads into a conversation about black aggro, how profoundly player perceptions shape a draft and our resulting understanding of our environments, just how broken Oko is, a theoretical cube whose only stipulation is that it cannot contain any cards in your main cube, Anthony’s new beginner-focused cube, the difference between trying to draft a good deck and trying to draft a 3-0 deck, potentially problematic planeswalkers that have such high starting loyalty that they basically can’t be attacked profitably, and modifying the rules text of cards for your environment. Anthony airs some justifiable grievances about how his matches went which slowly leads Andy to the realization that a certain card just has to go.

Discussed in this episode:

Save the Post Office Day of Action on August 25th

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.

Matchup Matrix Aug 17, 2020

Show notes

On this episode, Andy and Anthony discuss how Andy evaluates cards for his cube based on how they perform against opposing decks rather than on their interactions with other cards in the same deck. They do a pack 1, pick 1 from Allison’s Peasant cube, which they have had the pleasure of playing in paper in the before-times. While doing a deep dive on the matchup matrix Andy made for the mono-white aggro deck he rotisserie drafted, they get into details of specific matchups, why equipment and vehicles are kind of like Baneslayers, the joys of making spreadsheets about your cube, creating your own taxonomies to understand your environment, and the power of thought technology.

View Andy's Matchup Matrix Spreadsheet

You can find the hosts’ Cubes on Cube Cobra:

If you want us to do a pack 1, pick 1 from your cube on air send a link to your cube, your name, and pronouns to mail@luckypaper.co.

Musical production by DJ James Nasty.