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Usman Jamil

Usman Jamil

Magic: The Gathering cube writer, designer, and podcaster; known as "the Godfather of Cube"; writing about cube since 2010.

Sep 8, 2026

TrainmasterGTHOST
60:26
ahead.
60:26
I was going to say, it is interesting.
60:29
Red power level just seems a little across the board.
60:33
There's some stuff like Goblin Guide, which is more just like a relic, and just like Goblin Guide, Molten Gatekeeper, I think Stuck Out is kind of just...
60:45
It's kind of like whenever I just look at a fresh cube in the beginning.
60:49
A lot of my process is to just like look at individual cards and just focus on like the micro level kind of stuff it's like okay what what's going on power level you know just like what's going on from there and then it's kind of i mean i think that's probably how i do and i tend to look at cubes for you know just like if i suggest changes it's like looking at cards individually and being like, okay, this card probably looks bad, this card probably looks, you know, above the power level or something.
61:16
Looking for just things on that very micro level, where it's just like, yeah, this card might, like, Muldrifter, probably under probably the power level.

5 MINS LATER

TrainmasterGTHOST
66:51
I like it more.
TrainmasterGTHOST
50:18
Do you want to tell us about Bard, the heir of Gyron? Goryon?
50:23
Goryon? Yeah, I was talking to a buddy about it because I think I was driving at the time.
50:27
I'm like, Bard, heir of...
50:30
And we were trying to think of...
50:31
I was trying to think if it was like Firion? I'm like, no, that's the guy from Final Fantasy II.
50:34
It's not Firion.
50:36
I think he said Girion.

7 MINS LATER

TrainmasterGTHOST
57:16
I know this is one that I'm looking to play, but I was interested to hear your perspective on it.
TrainmasterGTHOST
41:58
Yeah.
41:59
Yep.
42:00
So the question I had, uh, you host a re- a yearly cube event called Cube Dungeon Con, and the site, I would consider more my cube writing home, aside from when I'm doing self-publishing.
42:10
Hipsters of the Coast, uh, did an article by Travis Norman, who I've known for a while from online spaces, uh, did an article about it.
42:19
Um, and I thought it was really interesting, like, you know, had, like, a lot of pictures, and it was pretty different from a lot of cube articles in that space.
42:25
But, like, how would you describe the, uh, Cube Dungeon Con, like, you know, the vibes or just, like, how it started, you know, just, like...
42:31
Or you can just say whatever you want to and meets your question.

13 MINS LATER

TrainmasterGTHOST
55:57
[laughs]
52:34
Oh, God.
52:35
Yeah.
52:35
So it was just this awkward standoff where it was just like, "All right.
52:38
Well, nobody's getting what they want." So it's like, I think eventually, like, I think somebody at the store just, like, w- went to be the eighth person because it was a event at the store.
52:48
But yeah, I, it's...
52:49
W- I think personally for me, just because I'm cheap and I'm a free-to-play player on Arena, like, one of the things that I really like about Arena is, like, if you're, if you scrub out and you're just like, "All right," and I don't wanna put more money back in, just, like, grind dailies for, like, a week or something, and it's like, "All right.
53:07
I'm back.

7 MINS LATER

60:00
Mm.
TrainmasterGTHOST
30:37
[laughs]
30:37
...
30:37
in, like, Magic, but I'm gonna assume, like, probably some, but not a lot.
30:42
But for...
30:43
And I'm gonna soapbox for a bit on this.
30:45
Uh, so Rush, you know, is one of the, you know, great pr- progressive metal bands, or probably progressive rock bands, I would say.
30:52
You know, started in 1974.

6 MINS LATER

TrainmasterGTHOST
37:21
[laughs]

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