Heads Up Cube Deck Analysis: Cad Bloom

I have been missing the prevalence of combo decks in the cube of late. Partly this is the lack of combo engines being printed alongside the increase in power to aggressive decks but also it is my fault for removing a lot of the narrower cards integral to various combo decks into the B cube or lower. Cad Bloom is not the best combo deck in the cube and is significantly weaker without Fastbond or the artifact mana power, Black Lotus in particular. The last time I built it was when Baneslayer Angel was basically the best card in the cube and no cards were banned. It was rather disappointing as I won every game by flopping down the Angel which I only played as I was a card short in the build and fancied an alternate win condition. Not wanting to repeat the last time and fail to win using the combo, the lack of the power cards and the fragility of the archetype were all set to make this a challenging deck to make and play.

There are two main ways to go with Cadaverous Bloom, either the Pros Bloom builds which use lots of blue draw and card quality to go off with the Bloom or replacing blue with white and using Oath of Druids and Academy Rector to set up the combo with Yawgmoth's Bargain as the draw engine. As most combo decks involve blue I was keen to build the latter version of the deck for a bit of a change. After playing the deck I would likely make a few changes however the deck was one of the most complicated to play out of any deck I have had in any format, certainly top five hardest to play, and as such I don't yet have a clear picture of exactly what I want and need to be doing. Here is the list for what I built:

23 Spells

Mox Diamond

Exploration
Sensei's Divining Top
Vampiric Tutor
Dark Ritual
Cabal Therapy

Scroll Rack
Demonic Tutor
Squandered Resources
Life from the Loam
Balance
Explore
Oath of Druids

Solitary Confinement
Eternal Witness

Replenish
Academy Rector
Natural Balance

Primal Command
Cadaverous Bloom

Yagmoth's Bargain
Death Grasp

17 Lands

Barren Moor
Secluded Steppe
Windswept Heath
Verdant Catacombs
Marsh Flats
Overgrown Tomb
Temple Garden
Godless Shrine
Savannah
Bayou
Scrubland
Golgari Rot Farm
Twilight Mire
Llanowar Wastes
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
City of Brass
Forbidden Orchard

Other Considered Cards

Vindicate
Pernicious Deed
Overgrown Estate
Emrakul, the Eons Torn
Burgeoning
Stirring Wildwood
Chromatic Star
Holistic Wisdom
Yawgmoth's Will
Sylvan Library

The reason the deck is so hard to play is that it never goes off in the same way, nor is going off a guaranteed win. You can either use the ramp and the tutors to find and cast a Cadaverous Bloom to go off or you can drop an Oath of Druids which does a mixture of two things. The Oath can fill up your graveyard with the spells you are after allowing you to either Witness back a combo piece or Replenish all of them to try and win. Alternatively the Oath can hit the Rector and also hopefully the Cabal Therapy allowing you to cheat into play one of the big enchantments left in your deck. The Oath is somewhat random although the cards you have in hand do give you some information to set up with accordingly. This inconsistency with Oath is the main reason for playing Scroll Rack as it is the only way to put cards from your hand back into your library in these colours.

Once you have the Cadaverous Bloom and the Yawgmoth's Bargain in play you have to find the Death Grasp and get enough cards in hand to pitch for a lethal Grasp. Often you either lack the life or the cards left in library to do this which is where Primal Command comes in. I considered a lot of other cards that could also help with these two requirements but as I was pretty tight on space I went for the one that helped with both. Overgrown Estate is very powerful and is better than Zuran Orb in the deck for the ability to get it off a Replenish and the extra life. In hindsight the Estate would have been better than Solitary Confinement in the build, both Balance and Natural Balance are far less useful without the ability to sacrifice your lands before casting. Emrakul was one of the options for graveyard reshuffling however the deck has few ways to put him in the bin and can be ruinous when dredging back Life from the Loam. Although it is quite possible to hard cast an Emrakul in the deck it felt a lot like I would just repeat my last encounter with the build and win every time with an Oathed up big dork which isn't nearly as much fun and makes most of the rest of the deck pointless.

The cards that I would happily remove are Dark Ritual, Sensei's Divining Top, Explore, Balance, Solitary Confinement and Natural Balance. I would also 100% for sure replace the Death Grasp with a simple Drain Life as Cadaverous Bloom does not give you white mana which was a bit awkward. Dark Ritual and Natural Balance can be outstanding but are quite situational as ramp goes. Burgeoning feels like it is probably better than Explore as the deck has few one drops. Swapping a two drop for a one drop would make me happier to replace top with Sylvan Library, especially if the Estates is played as then it becomes quite a reasonable card draw engine. By adding a Chromatic Star the Dark Ritual becomes more useful and gives extra ways to make a turn one Oath. It also makes the white cards much better when starting to go off with Bloom.





23 Spells

Mox Diamond

Exploration
Burgeoning*
Vampiric Tutor
Dark Ritual
Cabal Therapy
Chromatic Star*

Scroll Rack
Demonic Tutor
Squandered Resources
Life from the Loam
Balance
Sylvan Library*
Oath of Druids

Overgrown Estate*
Eternal Witness

Replenish
Academy Rector

Primal Command
Cadaverous Bloom

Yagmoth's Bargain
Drain Life*

17 Lands

Barren Moor
Tranquil Thicket*
Windswept Heath
Verdant Catacombs
Marsh Flats
Overgrown Tomb
Temple Garden
Godless Shrine
Savannah
Bayou
Scrubland
Golgari Rot Farm
Twilight Mire
Llanowar Wastes
Urborg, Tomb of Yawgmoth
City of Brass
Forbidden Orchard

This list is still very vulnerable to a lot of different effects in the cube. Counter magic, enchantment removal, graveyard removal and even the humble Meddling Mage give this deck some real problems. I was facing RG beats and UW agro caw blade (sortof, you could possibly call it UW fish instead). As such I knew it was more important to go fast and be consistent than it would be to pack lots of outs and make the deck robust. If I were facing UW control and the rock I would likely have lost things like Dark Ritual and played Thoughtseize and other solid cards like Vindicate. In both of my lists the only answers cards or outs you have are Cabal Therapy, Primal Command, Balance and your kill spell. This motley collection of cards are quite hard to use to solve your problems and make it pretty interesting trying to go off around something awkward.

If different and interesting is what you are after then I recommend decks like these. If you prefer not to destroy your brain in the name of entertainment then perhaps it is not worth the effort. My opponent was kind and didn't pack much in the way of cards I really struggle to beat even though they wouldn't overly harm their decks for the other match up. I also got my entire pick of what I wanted for the deck as I am trying to feature varied and interesting decks while also revitalising combo. All the games were pretty close and I managed a 1-1 losing to the speed of the RG assault which considering the leniency I was afforded does highlight the difficulties faced by combo.